Glenn Emery "Press" Presnell was an American football player, coach, and college athletics administrator. He set the NFL single-season scoring record in 1933 and led the league in total offense. He was the last surviving member of the Detroit Lions inaugural 1934 team and helped lead the team to its first NFL championship in 1935. He also set an NFL record with a 54-yard field goal in 1934, a record which was not broken for 19 years. Presnell served as the head football coach at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in 1942 and at Eastern Kentucky State College—now known as Eastern Kentucky University–from 1954 to 1963, compiling a career college football coaching record of 45–56–3. He was also the athletic director at Eastern Kentucky from 1963 to 1971.
Patrick Fain Dye is a former American football player, coach, and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at East Carolina University (1974–1979), the University of Wyoming (1980), and Auburn University (1981–1992) compiling a career college football record of 153–62–5. He served as the Athletic Director at Auburn from 1981 to 1991 and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 2005. On November 19, 2005 the playing field in the stadium at Auburn University was named 'Pat Dye Field' in his honor.
Fred Russell was an American sports writer prominent in the Golden Era of Sports in the 20th century. He was a lifelong resident of Nashville, Tennessee and was sports editor and later Vice-President of the Nashville Banner daily newspaper. His career spanned 70 years. He published three books of sports humor in the 1940s. Russell was a protégé and friend of famed sportswriter Grantland Rice.
James Wallace Butts Jr. was an American football player, coach, and college athletics administrator. He served as the head coach at the University of Georgia from 1939 to 1960, compiling a record of 140–86–9. His Georgia Bulldogs football teams won a national championships in 1942 and four Southeastern Conference titles. Butts was also the athletic director at Georgia from 1939 to 1963. He was inducted posthumously into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1997.
Bernie H. Moore was an American college football, basketball, track and field coach and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at Mercer University (1926–1928) and Louisiana State University (LSU) (1935–1947). Moore was also the head basketball coach at Mercer (1926–1928) and the head track and field coach at LSU (1930–1947). He was then SEC commissioner from 1948 to 1966. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1952.
Michael Joseph "Iron Mike" Donahue was an American football player, coach of football, basketball, baseball, tennis, track, soccer, and golf, and a college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at Auburn University, at Louisiana State University (1923–1927), and at Spring Hill College (1934).
The Alabama Crimson Tide football program represents the University of Alabama in the sport of American football. The team competes in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Western Division of the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The team is currently coached by Nick Saban. The Crimson Tide is among the most storied and decorated football programs in NCAA history. Since beginning play in 1892, the program claims 17 national championships, including 12 wire-service national titles in the poll-era, and five other titles before the poll-era. From 1958 to 1982, the team was led by Hall of Fame coach Paul "Bear" Bryant, who won six national championships with the program. Despite numerous national and conference championships, it was not until 2009 that an Alabama player received a Heisman Trophy, when running back Mark Ingram became the university's first winner. In 2015, Derrick Henry became the university's second Heisman winner.
Charles Martin Newton was an American collegiate basketball player, coach, and athletics administrator. He served as the head men's basketball coach at Transylvania University from 1956 to 1968, the University of Alabama from 1968 to 1980, and Vanderbilt University from 1981 to 1989, compiling a career college basketball coaching record of 509–375. He was chairman of the NCAA Rules committee from 1979 to 1985 and was the president of USA Basketball from 1992 to 1996.
Ronald George Polk is an American professional coach in NCAA Division I college baseball. He was a long-time head baseball coach at Mississippi State and is considered, by some, to be the "Father of Southeastern Conference Baseball." Polk compiled one of the most successful winning records, as a coach, in both MSU and Southeastern Conference history. In 31 seasons as an SEC coach he compiled a 1218-638-2 (.656) record. His career record stands at 1373-702-2. He currently ranks 9th on the all-time wins list nationally for 10+ year Division I coaches. His teams won five SEC championships and five SEC tournament championships. His teams participated in the NCAA tournament twenty-three times, and reached the College World Series eight times.
William J. Nicks was an American football player and coach. He coached at historically black colleges in the Southern United States from 1930 to 1965. Nicks served as the head football coach at Morris Brown College in Georgia and at Prairie View A&M University in Texas, compiling a career college football record of 188–57–21. He was the NAIA Coach of the Year in 1958 and his teams were declared the black college football national champions six times. Nicks was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1999.
Robert Emory Lamb is an American college football coach and former player. He is the head football coach at Mercer University, a position he assumed in 2011 when Mercer reinstated their football program after a 70-year hiatus. The Mercer Bears football program resumed play in 2013. Lamb served as the head football coach at the Furman University from 2002 until his resignation in 2010.
The 1927 College Football All-Southern Team consists of American football players selected to the College Football All-Southern Teams selected by various organizations in for the 1927 Southern Conference football season.
Mercer McCall "Mack" Tharpe was a college football player and coach, bomber pilot, and insurance salesman. He was killed in action during the Second World War.
Homer Lamar Grice was a college football player, English professor, Baptist preacher and first secretary of the Vacation Bible School Department at the Sunday Schoolboard, Nashville, a position held for nearly 30 years.
Byron Lambert "Crook" Smith was a college football and basketball player and coach inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame in 1979.
Fred Brooker "Whitey" Rawl was a college football player and coach. He also played basketball, baseball and track. He was a prominent quarterback for coach Billy Laval's Furman Purple Hurricane of Furman University, called the "siege gun" of the Furman backfield; leading Furman to a 23–5–1 record over his tenure. The 1927 team won the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association and was the only team to defeat NC State. In a defeat over The Citadel, Rawl ran 56 yards for the game's only touchdown. He also starred in a victory over Mercer. Rawl was later a backfield coach under Laval for the South Carolina Gamecocks.
