Georgia Southern Eagles

Georgia Southern Eagles
University	Georgia Southern University
Conference	Sun Belt Conference (primary) CCSA (women's swimming & diving) Southern (rifle)
NCAA	Division I (FBS)
Athletic director	Jared Benko
Location	Statesboro, Georgia
Varsity teams	17
Football stadium	Allen E. Paulson Stadium
Basketball arena	Hanner Fieldhouse
Baseball stadium	J.I. Clements Stadium
Softball stadium	Eagle Field at GS Softball Complex
Soccer stadium	Eagle Field
Mascot	Freedom (live); GUS (costume)
Nickname	Eagles
Fight song	Georgia Southern Fight Song
Colors	Blue and white [1]
Website	gseagles.com

The Georgia Southern Eagles are the athletic team(s) of Georgia Southern University (GS). The Eagles compete in the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) (formerly I-A) and are members of the NCAA Division I Sun Belt Conference. Prior to joining the Sun Belt Conference in 2014, the Eagles were members of the Trans America Athletic Conference (presently known as the ASUN Conference) and the Southern Conference (SoCon). During their time at the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS/I-AA) level, the Eagles have won six national championships.

The only Georgia Southern teams which compete outside the Sun Belt do so in sports that are not sponsored by that conference. Women's swimming & diving competes in the Coastal Collegiate Sports Association. Rifle, a fully co-educational sport in which GS fields a women-only team, competes in the SoCon. Men's soccer will compete in the Mid-American Conference starting in the fall 2021 season, following the demise of the Sun Belt men's soccer league.

Sports sponsored

Men's sports	Women's sports
Baseball	Basketball
Basketball	Cross country
Football	Golf
Golf	Rifle
Soccer	Soccer
Tennis	Softball
	Swimming and diving
	Tennis
	Track & field†
	Volleyball
† – Track and field includes both indoor and outdoor

Georgia Southern is a member of the Sun Belt Conference

Baseball

Main article: Georgia Southern Eagles baseball

An Eagles baseball player fields a pickoff throw during a 2014 game

The baseball team is led by head coach Rodney Hennon, who is in his seventeenth year at Georgia Southern. Georgia Southern played its first year of baseball in 1933. ^[2] The team went to the College World Series in 1973 and 1990 and has appeared in 11 NCAA regionals. The team was also crowned the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics National Champions in 1962, sweeping Portland State. ^[3]

The team won the 2009 Southern Conference baseball tournament with a 7 to 3 victory over top seeded Elon and clinch its first SoCon title since 2002. They also won the 2011 SoCon Tournament after Chris Beck pitched a complete-game shutout against Samford University. They lost two games against future national champion South Carolina, losing a 2–1 decision, and NC State, coming short by three runs in a 5–2 game.^{[ citation needed ]}

Men's basketball

Main article: Georgia Southern Eagles men's basketball

The head coach of the Georgia Southern men's basketball squad is Brian Burg. ^[4] The team participated in the NCAA Division I Tournament in 1983, 1987 and 1992, and the NIT in 1988, 1989 and 2006. ^[5] The first year of men's basketball at Georgia Southern was 1926, and the first year the school played in Division I was 1971. ^[6]

Georgia Southern basketball player Roger Moore was the first African-American athlete to receive a scholarship in the University System of Georgia. ^[7]

Football

Main article: Georgia Southern Eagles football

See also: 2018 Georgia Southern Eagles football team

The head coach of the Eagles is Clay Helton. The Eagles have won six NCAA FCS (I-AA) National Championships (1985, 1986, 1989, 1990, 1999, and 2000). In addition, the Eagles have won ten Southern Conference championships (1993, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004, 2011, and 2012) and one Sun Belt Conference championship (2014); with the Eagles' first Sun Belt title, they became only the third team, after Nevada in 1992 and Marshall in 1997, to win their conference championship in their first year at the FBS level. ^[8] Home football games are played at Allen E. Paulson Stadium, known as "The Prettiest Little Stadium in America." Georgia Southern fielded its first football team in 1910; however, the sport was suspended for World War II and was not restarted until 1982. ^[9]

Erk Russell

Main article: Erk Russell

In 1981, former University of Georgia Defensive Coordinator Erk Russell was hired to restart the football program at Georgia Southern College (as the university was called at the time), a program that had not competed in forty years. Erk Russell became America's winningest coach, leading to the Eagles to three national championships. The Eagles extended Division I's longest home win streak from 26 to 37 games, gaining distinction as the only 15–0 college team of the twentieth century. Russell's final record at Georgia Southern, after his retirement in 1989, was 83–22–1 (.788). ^[10]

Erk Russell addressed the team the night before his shocking and sudden death on September 8, 2006. Georgia Southern University and thousands of friends, family, and fans gathered at Paulson Stadium to mourn the passing of Erk Russell, one of America's most exciting and successful college football coaches. ^[11]

Since Russell's departure, football has continued to be prominent at Georgia Southern. Head coach Tim Stowers succeeded Russell and won the 1990 national title, while Paul Johnson added two more in 1999 and 2000 with teams led by all-time Division I rushing leader Adrian Peterson.

Beautiful Eagle Creek

Beautiful Eagle Creek

In the early 1980s, a drainage ditch that the team had to cross several times a day during football practice came to be called Beautiful Eagle Creek by popular Head Football Coach Erk Russell. When the Eagles traveled to Northern Iowa during the 1985 playoffs, Coach Russell brought along a jug of Eagle Creek water to sprinkle on the field. The Eagles were victorious and went on to win many national championships with the help of that magical water. Today, the jug is on display at Georgia Southern University and signs have been erected along the creek.

The Hugo Bowl

In 1989, ESPN was to broadcast a Thursday Night Football game between the Georgia Southern Eagles and the Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders. However, Hugo, a category 4 hurricane, was headed straight towards the coast of Georgia. At the time of landfall, Hugo ranked as the eleventh most intense hurricane to strike U.S. this century, and it delivered the highest ever recorded storm surge on the East Coast. Nevertheless, the decision was made to continue with the game. For safety purposes, an open line was kept between the press box at Paulson Stadium and the National Hurricane Center in Florida. The Eagles went on to defeat MTSU by a score of 26–0 in a game known as the Hugo Bowl.

Traditions

Nickname

Eagles is the third nickname of Georgia Southern University. From 1924 to 1941, the nickname was the Blue Tide. After World War II, athletic teams were referred to as the Professors, as the school was a teachers college. However, in 1959, when the school was renamed Georgia Southern College, a student vote was held to determine the new mascot. Eagles was chosen over Colonels by a narrow margin. ^[12]

Plain uniforms

When the football program was revived in 1982, the school did not have a large budget and coach Erk Russell ordered solid blue helmets and asked the players to put a white strip of tape down the middle. The uniforms consisted of plain white pants and blue jerseys without names. ^[13] With the subsequent success of the Eagles, the basic simple design of the uniforms has remained the same.

Notable alumni

Name	Class year	Notability	Reference(s)
Darius Eubanks	2013	Linebacker - Cleveland Browns
Adrian N. Peterson		Running Back - Chicago Bears
J.J. Wilcox	2013	Safety - Dallas Cowboys (Second Round Draft Pick in 2013)
Jerick McKinnon	2014	Running Back - Minnesota Vikings (Third Round Draft Pick in 2014)
Laron Scott		Defensive Back - New York Giants
Tracy Ham		member of the College Football Hall of Fame, 1995 CFL Most Outstanding Player
Michael Curry		Former head coach of the Detroit Pistons, former NBA player and president of the NBA Players Association
Rob Bironas	Attended, but did not graduate from GSU	NFL kicker, holds record most field goals in a game (8)
Victor Roache		MLB Outfielder, NCAA Homerun Derby Participant, Led NCAA Div.I Baseball in HR
Jeff Sanders		NBA player, first round draft pick
Todd Greene		MLB Catcher
Joey Hamilton		MLB Pitcher
Fred Stokes		Former NFL Player
Kiwaukee Thomas		Former NFL player
Earthwind Moreland		Former NFL Player

References

1. Georgia Southern Visual Identity Guide (PDF). April 19, 2016. Retrieved August 3, 2022.
2. "Archived copy" (PDF). www.georgiasoutherneagles.com. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 July 2011. Retrieved 13 January 2022.
3. Delma Eugene Presley, The Southern Century. Statesboro: Georgia Southern University, 2006. 179.
4. "Georgia Southern hires Charlton Young as coach". Sports.espn.go.com. 2009-10-04. Retrieved 2015-05-16.
5. "Georgia Southern Eagles Basketball 2005–06 Schedule - Eagles Home and Away - ESPN". Espn.go.com. Retrieved 2015-05-16.
6. ^[ dead link ]
7. Delma Eugene Presley, The Southern Century. Statesboro: Georgia Southern University, 2006. 190.
8. "Georgia Southern Claims Outright Sun Belt Title - Sun Belt Winners Score Big on Saturday" (Press release). Sun Belt Conference. December 1, 2014. Retrieved December 1, 2014.
9. Delma Eugene Presley, The Southern Century. Statesboro: Georgia Southern University, 2006. 50.
10. "GSUFANS.com". Tscsports.com. Archived from the original on 2008-09-07. Retrieved 2015-05-16.
11. "Columns | April 27, 2015". Uga.edu. 2015-04-27. Retrieved 2015-05-16.
12. Georgia Southern Football Media Guide, 2004. 188
13. Delma Eugene Presley, The Southern Century. Statesboro: Georgia Southern University, 2006. 230.

External links

• Official website