Great Teams and Eras: Builders of the Modern Era
Tuesday, August 15, 2006 | Football
As part of the celebration of the 100th season of Florida football, gatorzone.com will run a series of historical features throughout the preseason and the 2006 campaign. The series will give Gator fans an appreciation and understanding of the past teams and players that helped build the Gator football program.
During preseason practice, readers can learn about ground-breaking Florida teams of the past on Tuesdays and Thursdays with the “Great Teams and Eras” series. In addition to those stories, each Friday from the beginning of preseason practice until the season's first game will feature a look at one of Florida's legendary players as part of the “Gator Greats” series.
Once the season is underway, the look back in time will continue on Tuesdays and Thursdays with “Rivalries and Series” and “Great Games” entries relevant to the week's opponent. Occasionally, additional stories will be unveiled on Wednesday of game weeks when the opportunity arises.
As the 2006 football season approaches, take some time to sit back and reflect on the teams, players and moments that all lead up to this, the 100th season of Florida Gator football.
The Builders of the Modern Era
By: Norm Carlson
Florida's emergence as a force to be reckoned with in Southeastern Conference football began a few years after the end of World War II and the man whose leadership constructed the foundation was Bob Woodruff.
Woodruff, a man of few words, was named Director of Athletics and Head Football Coach at Florida on January 6, 1950. Ironically, in view of his later jousts with the Seminoles, he was hired on the campus of Florida State University at a meeting with the state board of control and UF president J. Hillis Miller.
His starting salary for the dual positions was $17,000 per year with no perks in that era which preceded television/radio shows for coaches. He asked for and received a seven-year contract and during his decade at the Gator helm he produced 29 SEC wins, 11 more than all previous teams managed in the conference from 1933-50.
Florida's SEC record from 1933-50 was 18-57-6, with no Gator team ever finishing higher than sixth. Woodruff teams finished third three times in the league.
Before arriving in Gainesville, Woodruff had been head coach at Baylor since 1947. His 1949 team finished 8-2, an impressive record for one of the have-nots of the Southwest Conference. The former star lineman for Coach Robert Neyland at Tennessee from 1936-38 had graduated with a degree in engineering, entered service in World War II and rose to the rank of major.
He was serving as assistant coach in the North-South Shrine All-Star football game in Miami in December of 1949 when the call came asking if he would be interested in interviewing for a Florida job.
“I had a good job at Baylor but decided to go up to Gainesville and talk to them,” Woodruff said. “It looked like a situation with good potential to develop the sort of program which could consistently challenge in the SEC.”
Woodruff, who proved throughout his career at Florida, and later as Tennessee's director of athletics, that he was a tough negotiator, would not back down on his demands and it took over 12 hours for the board to finally agree.
“Florida had potential but I felt it couldn't be reached unless the program had the money and authority to function,” he recalled. “The job wasn't getting done in recruiting, our facilities were below par and assistant coaches were underpaid. I wanted a separate department of athletics with the athletic director answering to the University president and the Gator Boosters needed to be reorganized.”
Among other key Woodruff decisions which would impact on the future of Florida football, and the athletic program in general, were:
- Borrowing $750,000 and going up with the west stands at Florida Field, raising the seating capacity from 22,000 to 40,000 and housing modern press box facilities and offices for the division of intercollegiate athletics.
- Creation of the high school all-star game and clinics on the UF campus as part of increased support of the Florida High School Activities Association.
- Increasing salaries for assistant football coaches in order to attract and compete for the best young coaching minds in college football.
- Consolidating the site of home football games in the state. Historically, the Gators had played home games from one end of Florida to the other. Under Woodruff, they played all home games in Gainesville and the annual Georgia game in Jacksonville.
- Creation of a separate Department of Athletics, which had been under the College of Physical Education.
- Reorganize the Gator Boosters to provide for state-wide solicitation of funds for athletic scholarships in all sports. (This enabled Florida to develop the SEC's best all-around athletics program.)
In addition to creating a better recruiting policy, higher salaries, and a more stable game schedule, Woodruff also created Gator football memories, especially in the Florida-Georgia series.
“Some of the most exciting wins came against Georgia,” said Woodruff. “Some of our most bitter losses came against them, too. I'll never forget the 1951 game, for example, when we were trying to establish our program.”
“We dominated Georgia, pushed them from one end of the field to the other, then they hit a long pass for a touchdown to beat us, 7-6.”
Woodruff also remembers the reversal of that game with Florida winning 7-6 in 1958.
“We only made two first downs all afternoon and Georgia kept moving the ball up and down the field. We would stop them deep in our territory and then Bobby Joe Green would punt the ball clear to the other end of the field. Finally, in the third quarter, Jimmy Dunn ran for 76 yards for a touchdown.”
Woodruff was walking off the field with Georgia head coach Wally Butts after the game and recalls asking him, “Wally, how do you like our offense?”
The biggest victory Woodruff's teams earned against the Bulldogs came in 1952 and that accomplishment still ranks at the top of the Gator performance chart in a Georgia game.
“We had been upset by Vanderbilt the week before and our fans and the media were unhappy,” said Woodruff. “Georgia had a good football team but our team was ready. The defense played an outstanding game and Rick Casares must have run for about 100 yards (he carried 27 times for 110 yards that day.) We beat them 30-0 and that win gave us the momentum to go on and have an excellent season and get Florida's first bowl bid.”
Woodruff's defenses also blanked the Bulldogs in 1956 (28-0) and 1957 (22-0). Overall, he was 6-4 against Wally Butts and the red-and-black. Only Ray Graves, at 6-3-1, had a better career chart against archrival Georgia until Steve Spurrier arrived on the scene.
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Ray Graves spent 13 years coaching defensive football for Georgia Tech and Florida was looking for a head football coach who would stress wide-open offensive football.
When Florida president Dr. J. Wayne Reitz hired this 42-year-old assistant coach, whose biggest claim to fame was creating the “monster” defense still used today, and asked him to give the Gators an exciting, unpredictable offense, it appeared this would be a strange marriage indeed.
Dr. Reitz took this calculated risk in January of 1960 and neither he nor the Gator fans ever regretted his action.
At Graves' first alumni meeting he got a challenge. A sportswriter had criticized Florida for firing an outstanding defensive coach and then hiring another one.
“During the question and answer session a fan asked what I thought of the article and why the Gators would hire another defensive coach when what they needed was offense,” Graves said. “I told him that's true, I have been associated with defense during my career at Georgia Tech, but in coaching defense I have been able to put in, organize and establish an offense which is the toughest to stop. This will be the offense we will run at Florida.”
Graves, who would prove over the next decade how adept he was at thinking on his feet in public, had the right answer to this first critical question.
Graves had little interest in the Florida job when first told by his boss and longtime fishing buddy Bobby Dodd that Dr. Reitz had called to inquire. He thought either Delaware's Davey Nelson or Ara Parseghian of Northwestern, the early contenders, were the two best choices.
“It wasn't until we were in Jacksonville for our Gator Bowl game against Penn State, and Van Fletcher and Dick Stratton asked me about it at a banquet, that I actually thought maybe it would be a good idea to listen to what they had to say. Coach Dodd told me maybe I ought to go down to Florida and find us some of those great private bass lakes to fish.”
Graves met with the selection committee after the first of the year and accepted the job for $19,000 per year and the promise that he indeed would open up the offense right off the bat.
“I had coached 13 years at Georgia Tech and appreciated the challenge of recruiting good football players who could compete in a first-rate academic climate,” said Graves. “I thought what we were really trying to sell student-athletes is they would live a lot longer than any of them would ever play professional football and they were coming to college primarily to get an education. I know Florida had the curriculum in about 15 colleges which was far more then we enjoyed at Georgia Tech and it would be easier to recruit the state as the head football coach of the state university. I think that was the main reason I accepted the job.”
After he took the position, Dodd gave Graves some advice about assistant coaches which he has always remembered and followed.
“Bobby told me that was the top priority, to get good assistant coaches because you're not going to win without them,” Graves said. “He said, 'Look at me if you don't believe that.”
Graves had several priorities when he arrived at Florida and obviously the selection of top-flight coaching staff topped the list. Part of Graves' success was his selection of outstanding assistant coaches and his ability to let them coach. It began with his initial staff of defensive genius Gene Ellenson, imaginative young offensive coordinator Pepper Rodgers, line coach Jack Green and other top-flight aids in 1960. It ended in 1969 with an exceptional staff including the wily Ellenson, offensive coordinator Fred Pancoast, line coaches Ed Kensler and Jack Thompson, and a young, bright backfield coach named Lindy Infante.
Infante was a sophomore hero on Graves' first Gator team, co-captain of the 1962 Gator Bowl team and perhaps best-remembered for his powering across the goal, barely staying in bounds to score the TD that set up a two-point conversion and victory over Georgia Tech in 1960.
“It was a Hollywood script with Bobby Dodd, Jr. as our quarterback, me coaching against my old boss and it got to where sometimes the media and fans lost sight of the football game itself,” said Graves. “We were both unbeaten, they were nationally-ranked and it was at Florida Field. Then to have it go down to the wire with Bobby, Jr. making a big play on our last drive and us going for two with 17 seconds left to win 18-17.”
Graves never had a doubt on the decision to go for two.
“Our kids had played so hard as underdogs and they deserved the chance to win, not tie. It wasn't a tough decision at all and the way it turned out it set the tone for our season,” said Graves. “Coach Dodd asked when we were walking across the field why we didn't go for a tie, he said, 'a tie never hurt anybody' but I think it would have hurt us that day and the win set a pattern that the Gators could win the big one.”
There were so many big wins with Graves at the helm, but his favorites include the 1962 Gator Bowl victory over Penn State, the 1963 upset of third-ranked Alabama in Tuscaloosa, the 1965 comeback over FSU, the Steve Spurrier field goal to beat Auburn and sew up the Heisman Trophy in 1966 and the birth of the “Super Sophs” in the opening game of 1969 against number one Houston.
His toughest loss was the 28-21 stunner against Duke in the Gator Bowl stadium in 1962 when the Gators lost a 21-0 halftime advantage. Next, was the 51-0 rout by Georgia in 1968.
His capsule comments on these games:
Penn State, 1962: “We ended the season with a loss to Miami and everyone was down. Penn State had a great team and we had to use every gimmick, including the confederate flag, to get ready. Tom Shannon and Larry Dupree had great games, Gene Ellenson put the “monster” defensive into action and we dominated them, 17-7.”
Alabama, 1963: “Bear Bryant had never lost a game in Tuscaloosa, they were ranked third in the nation and Joe Namath was their quarterback. I always remember seeing all the students and fans out on the runway when we returned. I think we had to make two passes at it before we could land.”
FSU, 1965: “When they scored and went ahead with two minutes left and had us at our 20, Spurrier put his arm around me on the sideline and said 'Don't worry coach, we've got plenty of time and we're going to win.' He was the only person in the stadium who was totally calm and he made me a better coach by taking us to the winning touchdown in five plays.”
Auburn, 1966: “It was a great offensive game. I think Spurrier passed for over 300 yards and punted for a big average. It still got down to his kicking a 40-yard field goal at the end when he hadn't ever been practicing them. Several members of the team had told me at breakfast that morning that Spurrier told them he had a dream in which he kicked a field goal to beat Auburn.”
Houston, 1969: “They had a great team and we had an all-sophomore backfield. That first pass of the season, 70 yards from John Reaves to Carlos Alvarez, set the tone for a storybook season. It was the only college game I've ever seen where people were still buying tickets at the half.”
Other priorities to be addressed during Graves' time at Florida included an air-conditioned dormitory and a better training table, plus one dire need which surprised him.
“Florida practiced on the grass drill field just across the street from the west side of the stadium,” he said. “After home football games we would have to go to practice on Monday afternoon, line up and go over the field picking up broken glass, old chicken bones and who knows what else was left because the drill field was used as a parking lot for the Saturday games.”
Graves negotiated with campus leaders for land further west of the drill field, called on friends in construction and road paving, most notably Sam Wall, to construct two practice fields with adequate drainage and fence the area and these fields which became the Gators' new practice area.
