title image via The Tennessean
After working to rebuild the Tennessee State football program for the past three seasons, year 4 for Coach Eddie George has seemingly begun to bear fruit. The Tigers currently sit a 7-3, their highest win total since 2016, with two games left in the season. TSU is also still in the Big South-OVC title picture this late in the season, a posiition that the program has not found itself since 2013 when then-coach Rod Reed led the Tigers to a second-place finish in the conference. Additionally, that 2013 squad qualified for an at-large bid, a potentiality that could also be in the cards for the 2024 team, provided they can add some more wins to their resume.
However for this Tennessee State team, the season has not been without its share of adversity and obstacles in their path, and unlike in previous seasons, the Tigers have not allowed those challenges to derail the team. The program has had to deal with the tragic loss of one of its members Chazan Page was tragically killed following the spring game. Within this season, TSU has had to recover from/stinging and disappointing losses to Tennessee Tech and UT Martin, two very winnable games. Coach George expounded on this on the most recent Big South-OVC football media call when asked by our lead writer Brandon King, to sum up his team in a single word, the Tigers’ coach said the following:
That word would be resilience. We say it every day in our team creed and it showed up time and time again. You look at us statistically, we’re ok defensively, we’re ok offensively, we have done a great job in special forces, special teams, [but] one thing we’ve learned to do was to fight through adversity [and] find ways to win. [We have] bounced from some tough losses and we’ve grown immensely from game 1 until now…..from that second half of the UT Martin game, the last six quarters we have played some really good football. We have to continue to get better for the next eight quarters and hopefully, we end up with some victories [so] that we can continue to play longer.”
This weekend Tennessee State heads to Boiling Springs, NC to take on last year’s Big South-OVC champion Gardner-Webb. Kickoff for the contest is set for 12:30 PM CST.
