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4C SPORTS/®l^c Charlotte $otft Tuesday, November 21, 2006 TURKEY DAY CLASSIC, THEN PIONEER BOWL Pioneer aims to earn its place in bowl season MONTGOMERY ADVERTISER PH0T04.L0VD QALLMAN Tuskegee's Richard Fitzhugh(3) finds a hole in the line against Albany State Oct 21 in a 17-10 Golden Tigers'win. Tuskegee wiil play Alabama State in the Turkey Day Classic Thursday. Tuskegee hitting stride with new coach By Herbert L. White herb.while(ithechariotlepost.com T\iskegee football coach Willie Slatei- has a couple of opportunities to learn what his first Golden Tigers team can do. Tuskegee will close the regular season Thursday against Alabama State in the Tiu'key Day Classic in Montgomery, then finish the season against Johnson C. Smith in the Pioneer Bowl on Dec. 2 in Charlotte. “Every week, every game is a new experience for me, but it’s been great,” Slater told the Montgomery (Ala.) Adveiliser. “All I can do is the best I can do. I try not to Slater worry about what people say You’re going to please some people sometimes. Other times, you’re not going to please folks. I just do things the best I know how, and we’ll see how they turn out.” Slater, who succeeded Rick Comegy has done pretty well in taking 'liiskegee to a 7-3 record. While the Tigers stumbled wiih upset losses to Miles and (ilarkAtlanta, they took down SIAC arch rival Albany State and upstart Lane ('Ibnn.). “When we want to play and decide to play, we can play” Tiiskegee quarterback Kevin Huff said. “Clearly we lost two games we probably shoifid have won. But then we beat Albany State. We’ve had some great athletes at Tbskegee in past j^ars that haven’t been able to accom plish that. “We’ve got a lot of yoimg guys on this team, but we’ve come together. I love what we’ve been able to do, and I’m glad I’ve got two more games with these guys.” The win over Lane was Tuskegee’s biggest so far. Both teams were playing for a Pioneer Bowl berth, and Ibskegee scored the final 14 points in a 42-28 victory “The kids played hard,” Slater told the Advertiser. ‘We were determined to win that game. We played better than we have been in some areas and you could see it on the field. The offensive line played better, the receivers were more consistent and we didn’t have as many mis takes. We’ve just got to build on that.” Tuskegee’s focus is on preparing for rival Alabama State. The Tigers have won two straight Ibrkey Day Classics and six of the last sev^, including last year 28- 27 in overtime. Slater, who is coaching his first Tbrkey Day Classic, understands its importance. “They told me about this game the first day I got here ... and the second, and the thu-d and the fourth and so on,” Slater said. “It’s funny The fans always seem to want to talk about the games you lose and they want to talk about Alabama State. I don’t get many questions about the games we win.” • Former Carolina Panther Dameyune Craig, who holds the professional record for most yards passing in a game, is the Tigers’ quarter backs coach. The coimtdown is on for Pioneer'Bowl IX. What? You’ve never heai-d of the Pioneer Bowl? You’ll read plenty about it in The Post over the next couple of weeks. If this were televi sion, we’d even put a lit tle clock at the bottom of the . page to let you know how far off kickoff is. But you won’t need that, because we’re here to school you. The Pioneer is the only bowl game that puts black colleges together in a post season game. No, it’s not the Super, Rose or even a car parts bowl. On the other hand, it’s not the Astro Bluebonnet, either, which means it’s still in business. The Pioneer is our game, our little piece of the bowl season rock. This year, the Pioneer has a chance to be special to Charlotte. That’s because the home team is none other than Johnson C. Smith, for mer poster children for bad football on a grand scale. But not this year. The Golden Bulls have seven wins in 10 games, they’ve won with guts and guile and have started to rally an entire campus arormd them. A win would be huge here. On the opposite sideline will be Thskegee’s Golden Tigers, the winningest pro gram in black college f(X)t- ball. Thskegee has a serious pedigree that indudeshaH of fame coach Cleve Abbott and Ben Stevenson, ai^ably the best HBCU playa: fi-om the first half of the 20th century Tbday the Tigers produce NFL standouts like Drayton Florence and Frank Walker, a couple of new schools who do what they do on Simdays. Tuskegee has the same record as Smith, but the Tigers have higher stan dards. That’s because they expect to be the best pro gram in black cohege football every season, or at the very least. Pioneer Bowl champi on since the Tigers don’t par ticipate in the Division II playoffs. Here’s proof that the standards in footbaH- mad Alabama are high: Some Tigers fans grouse that first-year coach 'WTOie Slater is stiU the wrong man for the job. Seems hke you just can’t please some folks. JCSU fans would hke to get to that place some day, and they might with Darjd McNeill as coach. Want proof? Twice he took over Smith’s program after the Bulls went winless the sea son before. He has a com bined 14 wins in the second campaign. Smith also has history The Golden Bulls didn’t invent football, but they did invent black college football, which • has a special place in African American culture. For those reasons and oth ers, the Pioneer Bowl is worth giving a look. Four bands — the real reason non football purists watch black- college games — wUl duke it out before kickoff And then there’s the game itself, with the upstart Golden Biills against tlie resident aristo crats fixim Tuskegee. Mytime’s up. Clock says 11 days xmtil kickoff Let Time Pass You By! Cliarlotte JPosit iscj^ie Now and receive a years worB^NEWS! (70^376-0496 6 The award winning covering Charlotte’s African American communit^^^B|B^^^health, sports, auto, arts, ehtertmnment, religion sections each week. Monthly, Th^ Post includes pages for^^^fen, teenagers and young adults and annually publishes spmal editions on Martin Luther King, Jr., tojp high school seniors, autos, weddings, and home improvement. Special features including Black History, Women’s Histo Wedding & Travel, and Back-to-School.
The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, N.C.)
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Nov. 21, 2006, edition 1
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