The 1980 College Football Season

The Hidden Yardage : The Story of the 1980 College Football Season Podcast with host Joe Moore relives the 1980 college football season one week at a time through the memories of those that played, coached, and covered it. It combines storytelling and interviews to recapture the wild moments and personalities of one of the sport’s greatest seasons. We thingk you will love to hear what Joe has to say here in the Pigpen and on his podcast.

We are pleased to have a guest in this edition that has a special podcast called;

The Hidden Yardage : The Story of the 1980 College Football Season Podcast with Joe Moore

Joe was kind enough to join us for a discussion on the players that dominated the decades of the 1980s and well into the 90s as well. Those players were at the collegiate ranks during the magical season of 1980.

The season was interesting on many fronts from the old school coaches like Paul Bear Bryant, Joe Paterno, and Bobby Bowden to the young whipper snappers that were devising all kinds of new schemes. It was the wishbone and power I offenses of the old guard having triumphs alongside the precursors of the run and shoot and other spread formations.

Players like George Rogers, Herschel Walker, Dan Marino, John Elway, and Jerry Rice were all making noise at their respective schools, WHile super defenders such as Lawrence Taylor, Reggie White, and Ronnie Lott were preparing to take them down. The Pitt Panthers had some great seasons with records of 11-1. 17 of their 22  Panthersstarters went on to start in the NFL. Russ Grimm, Mark May, Ricky Jackson, Hugh Green, Bill Fralich and Dan Marino along with a slew of others were significant professional players.

Coach Mouse Davis was incorporating the elements of the Run and Shoot offense with his quarterback Neil Lomax. Mark Hermann at Purdue was setting passing records himself, in fact Joe shares that 1980 was the first time in history where the National Champions had more passing yardage than rushing yardage. Jim Kelly took his arm from Western PA to South Florida starting a tradition of a run of great Miami Hurricane quarterbacks in this era. A time of change indeed, and an almost changing of the guard of how offenses would move the ball.

Joe brings us some of the highlights from these players coaches and teams of the magical season of collegiate football, that his podcast is based on.

The banner photo is of the 2009 Gator Bowl between the Nebraska Cornhuskers and the Clemson Tigers during the fourth quarter. contributed by Richmond96 Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

A Very Special thanks to information obtained from Joe Moore and his amazing The Hidden Yardage : The Story of the 1980 College Football Season Podcast