LUT WILLIAMS, BCSP Editor
NFL Hall of Famer “Prime Time” Deion Sanders has been on ABC’s Good Morning America many times, but never as a black college head coach.
But that’s exactly where he was Tuesday being interviewed by GMA host Michael Strahan a day after he was announced as the new head football coach at Jackson State University.
The official announcement was made Monday at the school after weeks of speculation and it came with all the fanfare one would expect for such a historic and ground breaking hire.
The subsequent media storm was so enormous that the JSU webpage announcing his hiring was unable to load Tuesday.
Sanders, 53, who established himself as one of the NFL’s greatest defensive backs and kick returners and perhaps its greatest showman during a sparkling 14-year career with five teams now takes his place as perhaps the most ballyhooed coach to ever land on the14 HBCU sidelines.
Appropriately for his unveiling, he entered JSU’s Lee J. Williams Athletic and Assembly Center Monday riding in a luxury Cadillac Escalade behind a police escort and the JSU’s famed Sonic Boom of the South Marching Band.
He termed his hiring a “match made in heaven,” while promising the contingent of JSU loyalists on hand, “We’re going to win. We’re going to look good while we win, and we’re going to have a good time.” He donned a custom-made pinstripe suit in the JSU colors and showed the crowd on hand the JSU logo stitched into the lining. It was vintage Prime Time.
Sanders’ job will be turning around the storied JSU program that has fallen on hard times recently. The perch atop the Southwestern Athletic Conference’s East Division where the Tigers compete has been occupied by chief rival Alcorn State for the last six years. JSU, meanwhile, has won just one SWAC championship (2007) in the last 21 years and has not had a winning season since 2013.
He hopes to re-invigorate the program helped by a contingent of assistants that he said have “84 years of NFL experience” either as players or coaches. He has yet to announce who those assistants are.
Sanders, who has spent the last couple of seasons coaching his son, a quarterback at three-time state champion Trinity Christian High School in Cedar Hill, Texas, and has been a head coach of the Under Armor High School All-America Game, comes in replacing John Hendrick who was fired after going 6-9 over a season and a half. Sanders is the program’s 21st head coach and fourth since 2013.
Sanders, who has spent the last couple of seasons coaching his son, a quarterback at three-time state champion Trinity Christian High School in Cedar Hill, Texas, and has been a head coach of the Under Armor High School All-America Game, comes in replacing John Hendrick who was fired after going 6-9 over a season and a half. Sanders is the program’s 21st head coach and fourth since 2013.
During the interview with Strahan, a Texas Southern and SWAC standout and fellow Pro Football Hall of Famer, Sanders outlined what was going through his mind when the opportunity to be the head coach at JSU came along.
First and foremost, God led me to Jackson State,” Sanders said.
“I was elated,” he added while outlining the school’s glorious gridiron history and its record of fan support.
“You’re talking about a school that’s unheralded (that draws an FCS tops) 33,000 (home) fans which is astounding. You’re talking about four Hall of Famers (Lem Barney, Walter Payton, Jackie Slater and Robert Brazille) that matriculated from this institution. I am excited, I am elated. I have on my whistle right now and I can’t wait to get on the grass and do some coaching.”
Strahan noted the recent successful recruitment of blue chip basketball player Makur Maker to Howard University and asked whether it is a trend for elite young black athletes to choose HBCUs.
“I’m praying so,” said Sanders. “Not just the young black athletes but their parents as well. That’s why we’re trying to show them how wonderful the dorms are at Jackson State, the training tables, we have new facilities going up as we speak.”
