Football Gazette's Small College Football Blog

Don Hansen's Football Gazette Blog of information, comments, notes, and tidebits on Small College Football. NCAA 1-AA & Mid Major, Division II & Mid Major, Division III, NAIA, and NCCAA

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

News and notes from around college football for June 26, 2006

The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame, Inc.

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Big Ten Reaches Landmark Deals for Television Coverage

The Big Ten Conference secured two new agreements last week that will redefine future television coverage for their 11 member institutions. On the same day the league reached a new 10-year rights contract with ABC/ESPN that will allow the networks to broadcast up to 41 football games a year, the conference announced it will partner with Fox Cable Networks to create a Big Ten Channel that plans to showcase conference programming 24 hours a day year-round. The new channel, scheduled to launch in August 2007, will air a minimum of 35 football games a year, at least two games of each team, in addition to hundreds of other Big Ten athletic events. The channel also gives each school the opportunity to annually produce 60 hours of content to be shown on the new station. The conference plans to make the new channel available through DIRECTV, satellite and cable television distribution as well as through emerging technology platforms such as iPods, cell phones and the Internet. Both Fox Cable Networks and the Big Ten entered into a 20-year partnership.

Watch List Released for 61st Annual Outland Trophy

Fifty-four players from across Division I-A comprise the watch list for the 2006 Outland Trophy, given each year by the Football Writers Association of America to the nation's top interior lineman. Eight schools (Boise State, Colorado, Louisville, Maryland, Ohio State, Southern Cal, Utah and West Virginia) placed multiple nominees on the 2006 watch list, which includes 45 seniors and 44 offensive players. Greg Eslinger, a 2005 Draddy Trophy presented by HealthSouth finalist from Minnesota, received the trophy last year. Presented since 1946, the award bears the name of former Kansas and Pennsylvania All-America John Outland, who starred as a tackle and halfback in the last decade of the 19th century and who earned induction into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2001. Thirty former Outland winners also are members of the College Football Hall of Fame, while three others, Washington's Steve Emtman, Virginia Tech's Bruce Smith, and Chad Hennings of Air Force, will be inducted this December at the National Football Foundation's 49th Annual Awards Dinner in New York City.

Two-Minute Drill

The Blue Ribbon College Football Yearbook, entering its sixth year of publication, will begin shipping on Monday, July 3. More information about ordering the book can be found at www.blueribbonyearbook.com... A section of Interstate 68 in West Virginia will be renamed after longtime WVU broadcaster Jack Fleming, the 1999 Chris Schenkel Award winner who passed away in 2001... Theopolis Bell, a former Arizona Wildcat standout and member of the Arizona Sports Hall of Fame, died at age 52 following a long battle with kidney disease... Texas A&M head coach Dennis Franchione and his Coach Fran Charities, which focus on after-school programs for children with special needs, have awarded over $43,000 to 13 different charities this year... Grambling renamed the press box at Robinson Stadium after former longtime SID Collie Nicholson...

Nittany Lions linebacker Paul Posluszny, the 2005 Bednarik and Butkus Award winner, was named the 2005-06 Penn State male student-athlete of the year... A.J. Hawk, the 2005 Lombardi Award recipient, was named Ohio State's 2006 Men's Athlete of the Year, the eighth such football player honored by the school in the award's 25-year history... Trey Waldrep, the son of former TCU tailback Kent Waldrep, became the first child of a player who competed against the Crimson Tide to receive a Paul Bryant Scholarship. Kent suffered a broken neck and paralysis during a game against Alabama in 1974... LSU wide receiver Xavier Carter was named SEC male athlete of the year... Among the 11 male student-athletes recognized as 2006 Medal of Honor winners by the Big Ten for proficiency in scholarship and athletics include Michigan State's Drew Stanton, Northwestern's Brett Basanez and Minnesota's Greg Eslinger, a 2005 Draddy Trophy Finalist...

Tennessee and Nebraska agreed to a two-game series for the 2016 and 2017 seasons... Miami (Fla.) and Kansas State will play a two-game series beginning in 2011... Nebraska and UCLA will play a home-and-home series against one another in 2012 and 2013... Iowa exhausted their 2006 season-ticket sales to the general public following a fifth consecutive year of increasing ticket sales... The cover of the Colorado football media guide will feature current coach Dan Hawkins with CU coaching legends Eddie Crowder and Bill McCartney...

The University at Buffalo's 2006 Football Kickoff Luncheon, featuring new head coach Turner Gill, will take place on August 4, with longtime play-by-play announcer Don Criqui as the keynote speaker... Players from the Naval Academy football team manned an informational table about their upcoming season at Camden Yards during the Baltimore Orioles-Washington Nationals three-game series this past weekend... Michigan will reach a record number of fans over the radio this year thanks to a new agreement signed with CBS Radio, the Chum Radio Group of Canada and Radio One... Central Florida has already added 2,600 new season-ticket holders for this season... Oregon will sport four different jerseys this year as a result of a two-year redesign effort by the school and Nike...

Florida Citrus Sports raised over $3,000 for their Foundation during their annual Member-Guest Golf Tournament last Friday... The West Virginia Coal Association will sponsor the upcoming seven-year series between Marshall and West Virginia, which will begin this September 2 in Morgantown... Nike signed a five-year agreement with East Carolina to be the Pirates' exclusive athletic apparel and footwear partner...

Former Red Raider All-Americas Zach Thomas and Don Rives will join five others as members of Texas Tech's athletic Hall of Honor class of 2006 during ceremonies in late October... The University of Minnesota's 2006 "M" Club Hall of Fame class includes former gridiron greats Sheldon Beise, Williams Arnold Bevan and Bob Fitch, all of whom starred for the Golden Gophers in the 1930s and 1940s...

Washington head coach Tyrone Willingham threw out the ceremonial first pitch prior to a recent Seattle Mariners home game against the San Francisco Giants... Colorado head coach Dan Hawkins, Air Force coach Fisher DeBerry and Colorado College coach Bob Bodor all spoke at the 2006 Sports Corp Football Kickoff Luncheon in Colorado Springs last week... Former Penn State legend Franco Harris will be the Guest of Honor at the 2006 Directed Electronics Charity Golf Tournament in August... Former Texas coach Darrell Royal joined UT associate athletics director for football operations Cleve Bryant as guest speakers at the San Antonio Quarterback Club luncheon last Monday... Pat Dye, the former Auburn head coach who received induction into the College Football Hall of Fame last December, is the keynote speaker for the University of West Alabama's 2006-07 Athletic Kickoff Dinner in August...

Athletics Directors Laing Kennedy (Kent State), Jim Livengood (Arizona), Terry Don Phillips (Clemson) and Kevin White (Notre Dame) were honored as Division I-A regional Athletics Directors of the Year by NACDA at their annual meetings last week... South Carolina strength and conditioning coach Pat Moorer received Master certification from the Collegiate Strength & Conditioning Coaches Association...

Dirk Koetter and the rest of his staff at Arizona State recently participated in the Future for KIDS All-Star Football Camp on campus... Former Princeton quarterback Jason Garrett and his Starfish Charities hosted their fourth annual Play It Smart clinic on Saturday for 200 kids in the National Football Foundation's academic-mentoring program... Indiana head coach Terry Hoeppner hosted a Youth Football Camp last week, which ran children of all ages through basic drills on both offense and defense... Penn State's 32nd annual summer football camps are expected to draw close to 3,000 high school players...

Phase I of the renovations taking place on Tennessee's Neyland Stadium, which include the addition of an East Club and infrastructure improvements, are scheduled to be completed in time for the Vols season opener against California... Alabama will partner with Action Sports Media to manage new video boards and LED signage equipment to be installed at Bryant-Denny Stadium this season... Renovations at Western Kentucky's L.T. Smith Stadium will begin this month after more than a year of planning... FieldTurf will be installed at Washington State's Martin Stadium well in advance of the Cougars home opener against Idaho this year... Iowa State's Board of Regents approved a renovation plan of Jack Trice Stadium that includes a bowled in south end zone and additional seating and concession stands... Jones AT&T Stadium, on the campus of Texas Tech University, will sport FieldTurf this year, the first time Red Raiders home games will not be played on AstroTurf in more than 35 years... The Marshall athletics department hosted a "Choose a Seat" day at Joan Edwards Stadium last Saturday to assist with sales for tickets to the general public... Texas is auctioning off the set of burnt orange Longhorn lights that appeared atop their north end zone scoreboard for the last 20 years...

Rice hired Chris Del Conte as the school's new director of athletics... West Virginia extended the contract of head coach Rich Rodriguez through the 2012 season... Iowa State football coach Dan McCarney received a salary increase this past week that boosts his salary $175,000 a season to $1.1 million through 2010... South Carolina hired former Gamecock offensive lineman Cedric Williams as a graduate assistant... Paul Troth will return to his alma mater East Carolina this year to serve as an offensive assistant... Arizona State hired Lyla Clery as their assistant athletic director for compliance... Ohio State hired Eric Lichter as their new director of football performance.

Schedule Spotlight: The SEC

Team - Date - First Opponent (Home/Away)

Alabama - September 2 - Hawaii (H)

Arkansas - September 2 - Southern California (H)

Auburn - September 2 - Washington State (H)

Florida - September 2 - Southern Miss (H)

Georgia - September 2 - Western Kentucky (H)

Kentucky - September 3 - Louisville (A)

LSU - September 2 - Louisiana-Lafayette (H)

Mississippi - September 3 - Memphis (H)

Mississippi State - August 31 - South Carolina (H)

South Carolina - August 31 - Mississippi State (A)

Tennessee - September 2 - California (H)

Vanderbilt - September 2 - Michigan (A)

With 120 chapters and 12,000 members nationwide, The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame, a non-profit educational organization, runs programs designed to use the power of amateur football in developing scholarship, citizenship and athletic achievement in young people. The NFF presents the MacArthur Trophy, the Draddy Trophy and releases the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) Standings. NFF programs include the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, Ind., Play It Smart, the NFF Center for Youth Development Through Sport at Springfield College (Mass.), the NFL-NFF Coaching Academy, and scholarships of over $1 million for college and high school scholar-athletes.

For more information, please visit www.footballfoundation.org

NFF Contacts

Phil Marwill.......................Director of Communications

Chris Caputo.....................Communications Assistant

22 Maple Avenue

Morristown, NJ 07960

973.829.1933 (phone)

www.footballfoundation.org