Troy University Football: A Storied History

Troy University's football program boasts a rich and evolving history, reflecting the institution's own transformation. From its humble beginnings as a teacher's college to its current status as a Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) competitor, Troy has established itself as a force in collegiate athletics. The current head football coach is Gerad Parker.

Early Years and the NAIA Era (1909-1975)

Troy University has fielded a football team continuously since 1946. Prior to that year, the team was fielded with many interruptions from 1909 to 1942. Coach George Penton led the Troy Trojans for two seasons, 1911 and 1912. Albert Elmore was the head coach from 1931 to 1937. In 1947, Fred McCollum took the head coaching position at Troy State. William Clipson was head football coach from 1955 to 1965. His overall record of 20-68 included a 6-3 winning season in 1964. On January 8, 1966, Billy Atkins was named the head coach of the Troy football team. In 1968, he coached Troy State to the NAIA National Championship and was named the NAIA Coach of the Year. Atkins finished at Troy State with a 44-16-2 record before leaving in 1971. He is the second-winningest coach in Troy history, only behind Larry Blakeney. Tom Jones was hired as Troy State's head coach in 1972. He served as the head football coach from 1972 to 1973, compiling a record of 11-7-2. Byrd Whigham led the Troy Trojans football program for two seasons and his teams compiled a 12-8 record in his two seasons. Former Kentucky head coach Charlie Bradshaw came out of retirement in 1976 to accept the position of head coach for the Trojans, which had become the school's nickname just a short time earlier.

During its early years, Troy University, then primarily an institution to train teachers for Alabama's schools, known at the time as Troy State Teachers College, laid the foundation for its athletic program.

Transition to Division II and a National Championship (1976-1990)

In 1983, Chan Gailey took over the head coaching duties at Troy State, where he led the Trojans to a 12-1 record in 1984 en route to the Division II championship. At Troy State, head coach Robert Maddox inherited a team which the previous season had gone 12-1-1, winning the NCAA Division II Football Championship. Despite this, in 1988, Troy State had its first losing season since 1982, going 4-6. The following season, the team showed little improvement, finishing with an identical 4-6 record. The program won the 1968 NAIA National Championship against Texas A&I (now Texas A&M-Kingsville). Troy beat North Dakota State in 1984 to win their first Division II national title.

The Larry Blakeney Era: Dominance and Transition to Division I (1991-2014)

Larry Blakeney became the twentieth head football coach at Troy State University on December 3, 1990. The program was officially still a Division II program, but were already approved to transition to NCAA Division I-AA the following season. The first full year at Division I-AA, the Troy State Trojans made it to the semifinal game and finished 12-1-1, 10-0-1 in the regular season. This marked the first undefeated, regular, full season of Troy State Trojans football and they finished ranked first in the end of season poll by Sports Network. In 1995, the team improved on that record finishing 11-0 in the regular season for the first undefeated and untied season in history. Troy State transitioned to Division I-A in 2001. During that season they defeated three Division I-A schools, including their first win over a BCS conference school, Mississippi State. In 2004, Troy's first year in the Sun Belt Conference, Blakeney coached his team to one of the biggest victories in the school's and the Sun Belt's history after defeating then No. 17 ranked Missouri 24-14 at home, in front of a national audience on ESPN2.

Larry Blakeney's arrival in 1991 marked a turning point for the Troy football program. Blakeney is the winningest coach in the Troy University history and he is the fifth winningest collegiate coach all-time in the state of Alabama, only behind greats Paul "Bear" Bryant, Nick Saban, Cleveland L. Blakeney officially retired at the end of the 2014 season. He led the program to three Southland Football League titles and five straight Sun Belt Conference titles, as well as guided the Trojans to seven FCS playoff appearances and four FBS bowl games. Blakeney finished with an overall record of 178-113-1 as head coach at Troy.

Under Blakeney's tutelage, many quarterbacks at Troy University broke school records and some national records. From 2010 to 2013, Corey Robinson broke the school record for career passing yards and is ranked No. 11 in the NCAA for all-time career passing yards with 13,477. One of his more memorable performances came the first game of his senior year when he rallied his team from a 31-17 deficit vs. UAB to a 34-31 OT win, in the process breaking Steve Sarkisian's record for highest completion percentage in a game with a minimum of 30 attempts. Upon Robinson's graduation, new freshman quarterback Brandon Silvers stepped in and set yet another national record in 2014.

Troy University football began playing in the NCAA's Division I-A in 2001, became a football only member of the Sun Belt Conference in 2004, and joined that conference for all other sports in 2005. The Trojan football team made its first bowl game appearance in the Silicon Valley Football Classic on December 30, 2004, that same season, but lost to Northern Illinois, 34-21. In 2006, Troy won the Sun Belt Conference for the first time after defeating Middle Tennessee in dramatic fashion in the last game of the 2006 season in a game that is now referred to as "The Miracle in Murfreesboro". As the 2006 Sun Belt Conference champions, Troy played in the New Orleans Bowl on December 22, 2006, against Rice University, routing the Owls of Conference USA by a score of 41-17.

Post-Blakeney Era: New Leadership and Continued Success (2015-Present)

In Brown's third season at the helm in 2017, he led Troy to a fast 3-1 start to begin the season. In the fifth game of the season on September 30, Troy faced No. 25-ranked LSU. After leading in the third quarter by a score of 24-7, the LSU Tigers began to mount a comeback in the fourth quarter by scoring 14 unanswered points and trailing just 24-21 with less than 30 seconds left in the game. LSU began to move the ball down-field before having only 8 seconds left on the clock. The very next play wound up being an interception for Troy, which sealed the upset victory. The win over LSU snapped the Tigers' 46-game non-conference home winning streak, which was the longest such streak in the country at the time. Ironically LSU's last non-conference home loss came to another Alabama school UAB 13-10 back in 2000. The Trojans would wind up winning the Sun Belt title after defeating Arkansas State in a thriller, 32-25. Afterward, Troy met North Texas in the New Orleans Bowl, with Troy defeating the Mean Green by a score of 50-30. Following Troy's record season in 2017, Brown would lead Troy to yet another 10+ win season in 2018. The Trojans began the season with a home-opener against No. 22 Boise State, in front of a Veterans Memorial Stadium record crowd of 29,612. The Trojans came up short, losing 20-56 to the Broncos, but would go on a 5-game win streak following the loss. During the 5-game win streak, Troy repeated what they had done the season before, beating another power conference team as they ventured into Lincoln, Nebraska and defeating Nebraska by a score of 24-19. In Troy's sixth game of the season, starting quarterback Kaleb Barker suffered a knee injury that kept him out for the remainder of the season. Brown decided to make Sawyer Smith the new starting quarterback for Troy afterwards. Upon suffering an upset loss to Liberty, Brown led Troy on another 4-game win streak, which included a win over South Alabama to win the Battle for the Belt rivalry trophy. In the last game of the regular season, Troy would play Appalachian State at Kidd Brewer Stadium in what turned out to be the deciding game to see who would win the Sun Belt's East division. Appalachian State would come away with a 21-10 victory over Troy, effectively knocking Troy out of the Sun Belt championship hunt. Upon receiving an invite to the 2018 Dollar General Bowl, the Trojans were pitted against Mid-American Conference East division champion Buffalo, who was 10-3 on the season and was considered the favorite to win the bowl game. Buffalo featured future NFL Draft Picks in QB Tyree Jackson, WR Anthony Johnson, and LB Khalil Hodge. Despite what the oddsmakers were predicting, Brown was able to lead Troy to victory over Buffalo, 42-32. The win secured Neal Brown's third consecutive 10+ win season, and set a new record in Troy football history as the first time Troy had ever had three successive seasons with ten or more wins.

On January 10, 2019, it was announced that Chip Lindsey would become Troy's 22nd head coach. He was previously on staff at Kansas as offensive coordinator for less than two months before being hired by Troy to be its head coach. Lindsey came to Troy with additional experience as an offensive coordinator for Auburn, Arizona State, and Southern Miss. Coach Lindsey's time at Troy was seen overall as a disappointment as he was only able to win 5 games each of his three seasons in charge. On November 21, 2021, Troy fired Lindsey with one game remaining in the 2021 season.

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There were modest expectations for Sumrall in 2022 as the Trojans were expected to finish third in the newly expanded Sun Belt Conference's West Division. However Sumrall was able to guide Troy to a record setting season. Troy finished 10-2 (7-1) in the regular season with their only losses being on the road at #21 Ole Miss 28-10 and 32-28 on the road against Appalachian State due to a Hail Mary touchdown. Inspired to avenge the loss Sumrall would lead Troy to 9 straight wins to conclude the regular season and clinch the 2022 Sun Belt West title. The Trojans went on to beat Coastal Carolina 45-26 on December 3, 2022, at Veterans Memorial Stadium in Troy, to win their seventh Sun Belt Conference Football championship. The following day Troy was ranked #24 in the nation by the College Football Playoff Committee. They accepted a bid to play against the #25 UTSA Roadrunners, Conference USA Champions, in the Cure Bowl on December 16, 2022. Unlike in 2022 Troy was on everybody's radar coming into the 2023 season and were ranked first in the SBC Preseason Poll for the West Division. Sumrall and Troy had flash backs to 2022 though as they started the season 1-2 with a 42-13 loss in Manhattan, Kansas to #15 Kansas State and the following week when Troy came up short in a tight loss to James Madison 16-14 at home. This would be Sumrall's first and only loss at home during his time as Troy's head coach. However, just as in 2022, Sumrall would lead Troy to win 9 straight games to finish the regular season 10-2 (7-1) and back-to-back SBC West Division Champions. On December 2, 2023, at Veterans Memorial Stadium Sumrall and the Trojans would find revenge from the previous season's loss to Appalachian State with a 49-23 win in the Sun Belt Championship. On December 18, 2023, it was announced that Gerad Parker would become the 24th head coach of the Troy Trojans. His previous stop was as offensive coordinator and tight ends coach at Notre Dame. Troy finished 4-8 (3-5) in Gerad Parker's first season as head coach with wins against Florida A&M, Coastal Carolina, Georgia Southern, and Southern Miss.

Conference Championships

Troy has won 23 conference championships, with eight in the Sun Belt Conference. The Sun Belt Conference began divisional play in 2018, with Troy being in the Sun Belt's East Division.

Postseason Appearances

The Trojans have made seven appearances in the NCAA Division I-AA/FCS playoffs from 1993 to 2000. Stephen F. The Trojans have made three appearances in the NCAA Division II playoffs and won the NCAA Division II national championship twice. The Trojans made one appearances in the NAIA playoffs and won the NAIA national championship.

Rivalries

Troy has an annual intra-conference rivalry with in-state foe South Alabama, known as the Battle for the Belt. The two schools first met on the gridiron in 2012, and have played every year since. Troy and UAB have met a total of 12 times. Both teams met fairly consistently until the shuttering of UAB's football program in 2014. UAB has since resurrected their football program. The teams are scheduled to renew their rivalry in 2028. Troy's rivalry with Middle Tennessee, now dormant following Middle Tennessee's 2013 move to Conference USA, is known as the Battle for the Palladium. Troy and Middle Tennessee first played each other in 1936, but it wasn't until 2003 that the schools started playing annually for the Palladium Trophy. When Troy was a member of Division I-AA in football, they played Jacksonville State almost annually in the Battle for the Ol' School Bell rivalry. The idea for a school bell trophy stemmed from the two schools' common origins as teachers' colleges from the late 1800s to the 1930s.

Veterans Memorial Stadium

Larry Blakeney Field at Veterans Memorial Stadium is nicknamed "The Vet" and has a seating capacity of 30,000. The stadium was originally dedicated to the Troy State Teachers College students and Pike County residents who had died in World War II. The stadium solely consisted of a small, 5,000-seat grandstand on the west side of a running track, and was built into the natural slope of the ground. It was expanded several times, including the addition of upper deck in 1998 that brought capacity up to 17,500, until receiving a large addition of seating in 2003 which expanded the capacity of the stadium to 30,000. The north endzone facility at the stadium is the largest featured end zone facility in the Sun Belt Conference and features a 3,150 sq.ft.

Traditions

During the pre-game show at Veterans Memorial Stadium, the Sound of the South will perform what is known as the "Trojan Fanfare." The band will line up around the concourse of the stadium, from the east side, to the south side, to the west side, and begin to play the "Trojan Fanfare". They later run down the steps around the stadium toward the field, and get into formation on the field to begin pregame. One of the more popular traditions of gameday, during the pre-game show the band marches onto the field to prepare for the football team to run out of the gates. The band falls silent, and the announcer then recites the phrase from William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar.

University Academics

Troy as an institution to train teachers for Alabama's schools. Celeste Darby and Emesa Locke. was Edgar M. The Old Hilliard Place was purchased from W.B. Dr. Ralph W. The Sound of the South starts, under the direction of Dr. John M. Governor Lurleen B. Athletics (NAIA) football national championship. Dr. Legendary band director Dr. John M. was Edgar M. Dr. the inaugural season is highlighted by an SEC win over Mississippi State on Oct. Irish Week Celebration is initiated (Alabama's official St. distinguished alumnus Dr. Manuel H. Gov. teams. TROY forms the Manuel H. Troy University mathematics professor Dr. TROY dedicates Manuel H. Dr. John M. The TROY football team defeats Navy 41-31 on Nov. dedicating R. TROY dedicates a major renovation of Wallace D. Malone Jr. TROY dedicates the new John M. degree - the Ph.D. TROY officials dedicate the Center for Student Success in honor of Dr. John W. Dr. River. The John M. an All-Steinway School. first Doctor of Philosophy degree, earning the Ph.D. Texas. mentors from the community. Enrichment at the University’s Dothan Campus. F. the Ronald E. The Sorrell College of Business earns initial AACSB Business Accreditation. schools around the world assess the quality of their educational services. education. Association of College and Schools’ Commission on Colleges to offer a new Ph.D. in Global Leadership. NCAA Div.

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