Unbeaten AAMU Host GSU to Headline Saturday Lineup

Louis Crews Stadium has been a house of horrors for opposing teams since it opened 16 years ago.

The Bulldogs 49-27 games at the stadium that is named for the legendary coach who led Alabama A&M to four conference championships and is No. 1 on the school’s all-time victory list. They have won 34-7 in their last 41 home games, and they are 32-13 under Coach Anthony Jones at Louis Crews Stadium.

Saturday, the Bulldogs hope to add another victim to their list when they host Grambling State in the Louis Crews Classic. The game will be streamed live on ESPN3 and shown taped delayed on ESPNU at 9:30 p.m. CT.

Visit the Weekend Preview Page for the full SWAC Football Schedule for Saturday.

The game will be the second for the Bulldogs’ at their newly refurbished home, which has a seating capacity of 21,000, features a state of the art press box, 19 luxury boxes, and the George Hobson Field House that houses the football coaches’ offices, the Robert Mathis weight room and locker room space and is the sixth-largest stadium in Alabama. The original grass playing field has been replaced with artificial turf at a cost of $1.1 million. Other upgrades include power washing the stadium, installing new flooring in the visitors’ locker room and repainting all the handrails in the stadium.

Their spruced up digs seem to have energized the Bulldogs. They erupted for 421 yards total offense as they defeated Prairie View A&M 42-20 two weeks ago in their first game on the new surface. They doubled their touchdown total for their first two contests as quarterback Deaunte Mason accounted for all six Bulldog scores.

“It’s mental,’’ Jones says of the effect the new playing surface has had on his team. “It’s a mindset. It’s almost as if we’re getting a new stadium. It’s beautiful. It feels great and looks great. The stadium looks like a new facility. Guys are taking ownership and pride in it.’’

Jones, however, questions how much of an advantage the new surface actually gives his team.

“Some people say it helps win some say it doesn’t,’’ he says. “You can say you you’re your new surroundings but when the game starts, reality starts to set in when you get hit.’’

The popular opinion is that playing on turf is ideal for teams that are built for speed and makes teams that have quickness even quicker.

“If it makes my guys quicker, it makes their quicker too,’’ Jones says. “It reminds me of when I was a kid and I got my first pair of PF Flyers (a brand of sneakers popular in the 1960s). I thought I could run faster (shoe’s slogan was ‘run faster, jumper higher with PF Flyers). It’s just a different feel. In reality you’re the same athlete.’’

There is no question, however, whether the stadium will help the Bulldogs’ bottom line. With the artificial surface, Louis Crews Stadium will host 10 high school and four middle school football games in addition to Alabama A&M's home schedule.

The Huntsville City Council and the city school board will pay Alabama a $1,750 per game stadium use fee for every high school and school game played at Crews Stadium. The school board will pay the cost of the public address announcer, scoreboard and clock operators and clean up after games.

Parking revenues will go to the school system or the designated host school. However, Alabama A&M gets all money from concessions.

The turf’s financial benefits are only a sidebar to Saturday’s game. The main story is the divergent plights of the teams, which played for the 2011 SWAC Championship.

Grambling, the defending conference champion and the preseason favorite to win the SWAC West title, is 0-3 overall and 0-2 in the conference. Alabama A&M is 4-0, its best start since beginning the 1966 season 5-0. The Bulldogs lead the SWAC East with a 2-0 conference mark.

Jones says Grambling’s slow start means very little. The Tigers were 1-3 after four games last season including a home loss to the Bulldogs and eventually slid to 1-4. They ended the season with seven straight victories.

“We know what their history has been,’’ Jones says, whose team was 0-2 last season before rebounding to win the East title. “That’s something we have to get beyond. They’re in a situation very similar to last year, not only for them but us too. We were able to turn things around and Grambling was too. That’s something we have to be careful about and not look at who they played.’’

Grambling is coming off a bye week, which Coach Doug Williams says was much needed.

“We needed to regroup and sit back and look at what has happened over the last few weeks,’’ Williams says. “Hopefully, we got our minds right.’’

The G-Men have suffered a pair of one-point conference losses, 16-15 against Alcorn State and 19-18 against Alabama State. Their other defeat was a 56-0 defeat at the hands of TCU, which is ranked No. 17 among Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams.

Offense has been Grambling’s downfall. The G-Men are in the bottom three in the conference in total yards, scoring and passing. Sophomore quarterback D.J. Williams, the coach’s son, has been ineffective. His best passing game was his 107-yard effort against Alabama State two weeks ago. He left the game in the second half after suffering cramps and didn’t return. Frank Rivers replaced him and completed 14 of 19 passes for 173 yards and two touchdowns. Doug Williams says his son will continue as the starter.
“We’re not going anywhere with the quarterback situation,’’ the coach says. “There is not a quarterback controversy.’’

On the other hand, Alabama A&M quarterback Deaunte Mason is on a roll. He was named SWAC Offensive Player of the Week the each of the past two weeks while passing 510 yards and five touchdowns while leading the Bulldogs to wins against Prairie View and Texas Southern.

“What Deaunte is doing now,’’ Jones says, “is the reins are off him as far as him controlling the game. He watches lot of film with me. We go over the game plan; we talk about the game plan; he’s in here when we’re installing it. He knows what we don’t want to do. He understands that ‘When you’re in control, we’re in control.’ He has the freedom of looking at plays and saying this is not what we want or keeping the play.’’

The series between Alabama A&M and Grambling has developed into a real rivalry. The teams have met in the conference championship game with Grambling winning each time. Jones and Williams were teammates with the Washington Redskins and were roommates the night before Williams’ record-setting MVP performance in Super Bowl XXII.

Alabama A&M defeated the G-Men 20-14 in a game that featured the conference’s top two rushers. Dawrence Roberts led the SWAC with 110.2 yards a game for Grambling, and Kaderius Lacey was No. 1 in rushing yards with 1,143. Both have been hampered by injuries this season. Lacey is No. 2 in the conference with 285 yards (71.2 a game); Roberts is tied for No. 8 with 146 (48.7).

Print Friendly Version