Head Coach Johnny Majors
In his Salad Days at Pitt
Another all-time great in Pittsburgh sports has left the Departure Lounge today. John Majors, two time head football coach at Pitt, died today at the age of 85, but his legacy stretches far beyond the University of Pittsburgh.
The son of football coach, Majors was an All-American at the University of Tennessee. In 1956, he finished second to Notre Dame's Paul Hornung for that year's Heisman Trophy, and after a stint in the Canadian Football League, he embarked on a coaching career that would land him head coaching positions at Iowa State, Pitt, and Tennessee, his alma mater. His career record was 185-137-10. He is in the College Football Hall of Fame, and he won four separate Coach of the Year Awards over the course of his career. But since this is a Pittsburgh based Blog, let's talk about his time in this little corner of the sports world.
In 1973, he was hired by Pitt to rescue what was a moribund (to put a kind face on it) football program. To do so, he scoured the country and brought in over 100 scholarship players for that first season (you could do that in the NCAA back in those days), one of whom was to become one of the greatest Pitt players ever and its only Heisman Trophy winner, Tony Dorsett.
He also changed the colors, logo, and font of the uniforms and helmets.
Subsequent decisions over the years to change colors, logos, and fonts have so roiled up the Pitt fan base that it probably cost at least one athletic director his job.
Anyway, the "Major Change In Pitt Football" that was predicted did occur and culminated in a 12-0 record and a National Championship for Pitt in 1976, the year Dorsett won his Heisman Trophy.
Following that magical season, Majors left for his "dream job" at Tennessee, where he coached for 16 seasons, won 116 games, and a couple of SEC titles. By then Pitt Football had again fallen on hard times, and Majors, after being eased out in Knoxville, came back to Pitt as HC. This "Back to the Future" stint didn't work out nearly as well: four losing seasons and a 12-32 record (as opposed to 33-13-1 from 1973-76) before he stepped aside. No one at Pitt ever seemed to hold that second administration record against him, and Majors remained a part of the Pitt family right up until the end. I honestly don't think that I've ever heard anyone say anything bad about him.
A couple of interesting notes I discovered while researching for this post. One, a football player at Tennessee named Harvey Lee Yeary became fast friends with Majors during their time at Knoxville. When Yeary decided to become an actor, he adopted the name of Lee Majors after his football playing buddy. Two, Wikipedia lists a coaching tree for Johnny Majors that lists twenty-seven men who went on to become head coaches in college and the pros. I won't list them all, but among them are Jimmy Johnson, Dom Capers, Jon Gruden, Jackie Sherrill, Dave Wannstedt, and Ron Zook. Three, he has a street named after him, Johnny Majors Drive, on the campus at UT where the football team's practice facility is located.
Quite a legacy.
RIP Johnny Majors.
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