Charles McClendon
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Charles McClendon | ||
|---|---|---|
 |
||
| Title | Head coach | |
| College | LSU | |
| Sport | Football | |
| Team record | 137-59-7 | |
| Born | October 17, 1923 | |
| Place of birth | Lewisville, Arkansas | |
| Died | December 6, 2001 (aged 78) | |
| Place of death | Baton Rouge, Louisiana | |
| Career highlights | ||
| Overall | 137-59-7 | |
| Coaching stats | ||
| College Football DataWarehouse | ||
| Playing career | ||
| ???? - ???? | University of Kentucky | |
| College Football Hall of Fame, 1986 | ||
Charles Youmans McClendon (1923–2001), also known as "Charlie" McClendon or "Cholly Mac," was born on October 17, 1923 in Lewisville, Arkansas.
McClendon is best known as the LSU head football coach whose tenure spanned the 1960s and the 1970s. As a result of his head coaching career, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1986.
McClendon played college football under Bear Bryant at Kentucky.
McClendon's first coaching job was as an assistant at Vanderbilt University in 1952.
In 1953, he came to LSU as an assistant under head coach Gus Tinsley. He was retained as an assistant when Paul Dietzel took over the team in 1955. In 1958, McClendon helped Dietzel coach LSU to its first recognized national championship. At the end of the 1961 season, Dietzel left LSU and hand-picked McClendon to be his successor.
McClendon would serve as the LSU head coach for the next 18 years (1962-1979), the longest tenure of any football coach in LSU history.
During his first 12 years (1962-1973), McClendon coached the Tigers to 9 appearances in the final AP Poll, with an average rank of 9.22. During this time, LSU's record was 97-32-5 (.724 winning percentage) and LSU went to two Sugar Bowls (1965 and 1968), two Cotton Bowls (1963 and 1966) and two Orange Bowls (1971 and 1974). LSU won nine games in five consecutive seasons from 1969-73, but during that stretch, LSU won only one SEC championship (1970) and one bowl game in four visits (1971 Sun Bowl vs. Iowa State).
In 1969, LSU was 9-1 and ranked fifth, but when the Cotton Bowl denied the Tigers a matchup with top-ranked and undefeated Texas, LSU players refused invitations by the Bluebonnet Bowl and Liberty Bowl, instead opting to stay home. Tiger fans suspected the culprit for the Cotton Bowl snub was the decision by Notre Dame to lift its self-imposed bowl ban and participate in post-season play for the first time since 1925. When the Irish opted to return to the bowl scene, the Cotton Bowl snapped up Notre Dame. The seething antipathy between LSU and Notre Dame boiled over into a two-year series between the schools in 1970 and 1971, in which the home team won each game (Notre Dame in 1970, LSU in 1971).
However, despite all LSU's success during this period, the Tigers only had a 4-7-1 record against Ole Miss and a 2-8 record against Bear Bryant's Alabama. 1970 was the only year that McClendon beat both Ole Miss and Alabama in the same season, and not coincidentally the only year his Tigers finished undefeated in the SEC. McClendon was awarded National Coach of the Year by the American Football Coaches Association. The Tigers would lose the Orange Bowl to Nebraska.
McClendon's 1973 team lost 3 games in a row to end the season 9-3. Those games included Alabama and Tulane. This was the Tigers' first loss to Tulane since 1948 and signaled the beginning of a decline. During McClendon's last 6 seasons as LSU's head coach (1974-1979), LSU had no appearances in the final AP Poll. During this time, LSU's record was 38-29-2 (.551 winning percentage). The Tigers also lost to Tulane in 1979, but that was followed by one more game, a 34-10 win over Wake Forest in the Tangerine Bowl, McClendon's final win.
In addition to the LSU football coaching record for longest tenure (18 years), McClendon holds the LSU record for most wins (137 [which includes 2 forfeits to LSU]), most losses (59), most bowl appearances (13), most bowl wins (7), and most bowl losses (6).
After his retirement from LSU, McClendon became the executive director of the Tangerine Bowl (which would later be renamed the Capital One Bowl) from 1980 to 1981. He was also the president of the American Football Coaches Association in 1979 and executive director from 1982 to 1994. The practice facility at LSU was named in his memory on September 9, 2002, nine months after his death on December 6, 2001. Ironically, his death came just two days before LSU won its first outright SEC championship in 15 years under then Coach Nick Saban.
[edit] See also
| Preceded by Paul Dietzel |
LSU Head Football Coach 1962-1979 |
Succeeded by Bo Rein |
|
|||||
