Saturday's game will be special for UA running backs coach Calvin Magee.
Magee grew up in New Orleans, a few hundred miles from the Grambling State campus.
He played collegiately at Southern University, Grambling’s heated rival, and played in four Bayou Classics in New Orleans.
Magee’s teams went 2-2 against Grambling, then a powerhouse program led by the legendary Eddie Robinson.
“Flashbacks,” he said. “It’s a big game for me. I played them in college because of the Bayou Classic. It’s nice to be able to play them again. They were really good, and they’re playing well now.”
Magee, a tight end, went on to play in the NFL. He was enshrined in Southern’s Hall of Fame in 2000.
Magee said he never considered Grambling out of high school. Rather, he planned to attend his hometown school of Tulane.
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How’d he end up at Southern?
“Larry Smith signed me, then he left after I signed and came to Arizona,” Magee said. “I got upset and didn’t want to go there anymore, so I went to Southern kinda being mad.”
Small world: Smith, Arizona’s coach from 1980-86, was posthumously inducted into the Wildcats’ Hall of Fame on Friday.
