Appearing on ESPN’s award-winning ‘GameDay’ program in its first-ever broadcast from Jackson, Mississippi, Jackson State head coach Deion Sanders on Saturday outlined his mission, acknowledged he intends to listen to potential Power-5 suitors and once again took a shot at detractors who question Sanders’s authenticity to the Southwestern Athletic Conference.
With a large crowd filed in behind ESPN’s ‘GameDay’ set, Sanders rode a motorcycle to the stage and joined a panel of personalities that included former Michigan star Desmond Howard and former West Virginia standout Pat McAfee as well as former Ohio State quarterback Kirk Herbstreit.
The Tigers (7-0) host rival Southern (5-2) Saturday afternoon.
“This is what we dreamt of,” Sanders said, praising the support he said he has received from both the HBCU community as well as from the people of Jackson. “Thank you all for bringing it here.”
Sanders, who’s won 18 of his last 20 games as Jackson State’s leader and guided the Tigers this season to a program-record No. 5 Football Championship Subdivision national ranking, again answered questions in a forthright manner – saying he lied once about his mother, who worked multiple jobs as Sanders grew up, and then vowed to no longer lie after that time.
Sanders was asked by host Rece Davis about the potential for a major-college head coaching job.
“First, I gotta stay focused and maximize these moments,” Sanders said. “When we cross that hurdle, we’ll cross that hurdle.
“I’d be a fool and liar to tell you I’m not going entertain those things, because I am. But I have made no plans to move.”
Recently Arkansas Athletics Director Hunter Yurachek revealed that he interviewed Sanders multiple times for the Razorbacks’ top job before Yurachek hired Sam Pittman. A year ago sources confirmed to FootballScoop that TCU also interviewed Sanders after the Horned Frogs moved on from Gary Patterson.
Sanders also emphasized his passion for coaching and touted former mentors who included late College Football Hall of Famer Bobby Bowden as well as Mickey Andrews and Ray Rhodes, among others.
“I love coaching,” Sanders said. “There’s not one day I wake up at 3:45 a.m. and say, ‘I don’t wanna do it.’
“I can’t wait to get in and just have a good time with young men and women.”
"I BELIEVE"
— COACH PRIME (@DeionSanders) October 27, 2022
Sanders elaborated on his “I Believe” mantra that has come to be synonymous with his Jackson State program and been emblazoned across much of the Tigers’ Under Armour gear.
“I believe, it’s not just about football,” Sanders said. “It’s about the single mothers.
“It’s about the fathers in a hospital on dialysis.”
As Sanders wrapped his appearance and in a nod to his ongoing feud with Alabama State coach Eddie Robinson Jr., also a former NFL player, Coach Prime asked the ESPN crew if he could lead the crowd in one chant.
“Who is SWAC, baby?,” Sanders exclaimed to the crowd, which quickly echoed Sanders’s cheer. “Who is SWAC, baby? Who is SWAC, baby?”
Led by first-year coach Eric Dooley, hired by the Jaguars last December away from Prairie View A&M where Dooley had completely turned around that program, Southern has lost just once in SWAC play – at Texas Southern – and most recently held off rival Alcorn State in its last SWAC contest.