Georgia Tech’s 1966 team, the last to reach 7-0, swept up by current Jackets

“Those guys are good,” said Billy Schroer, a team captain and playmaking linebacker on a standout defense. “They’ve got a good football team.”

“They get the most out of them that’s possible,” said Jim Breland, a first-team All-American center and another captain. “I give them a lot of credit for that. Don’t get me wrong; they do have some outstanding players. But overall as a team, I think they’re doing a great job on the coaching side.”

The 1966 team holds an entrenched place in Tech football history. The Jackets finished the season at 9-2, reaching No. 5 in the AP poll and finishing No. 8, a status matched or bettered only twice in the decades since.

They also were the final team coached by the legendary Bobby Dodd, who retired after the season, and also among the last before the football program was integrated in 1969. In their late 70s and early 80s, team members have been quite pleased to be remembered all these years later, such as when the ESPN broadcast of Saturday’s win over Duke made mention that the Jackets’ 7-0 start was their first since 1966.

“I immediately called my son — he lives in California,” Stevenson said. “And I said, ‘I’ve got news for you, pal. Your old man was on that team.’”

There are connections between the two teams. Stevenson, a career entrepreneur who now teaches at the University of South Carolina business school, appreciates the discipline that coach Brent Key’s team plays with. It is reflective of how Dodd coached his teams.

“Bobby Dodd would sit you down if you were offsides,” Stevenson said. “He said, ‘There’s no reason to be offsides. All you’ve got to do is turn in and look at the ball. And the ball moves, that’s when you move.’”

They both were propelled by narrow wins over highly regarded Clemson teams in the third games of their seasons.

Credit: Laughead Photographers

Credit: Laughead Photographers

“After two, three, four games, we said, ‘OK, we’ve beaten people; we’re going to keep on beating people,” said Craig Baynham, a flanker who went on to play in the NFL.

Coincidentally, Baynham’s son Grant also played at Tech in the 1990s and was the host for a recruiting visit from an offensive-line prospect from Alabama named Brent Key.

Rather disappointingly, the elder Baynham had little to report from his son of the visit.

“It was very run of the mill,” said Baynham, who lives in North Augusta, South Carolina, spending much of his professional career working at a nuclear power plant.

Memories from the 1966 team center on the revered Dodd. These men continue to hold him in the highest regard. Schroer, who went on to a career in financial consulting and lives in Acworth, called it “one of the greatest honors of my life” to have played for him.

“He treated you like a man,” Schroer said. “He knew more football than most people had ever even forgotten. He was just somebody that everybody looked up to.”

Alternately called The Gray Fox and The Whistle, Dodd had a way of instilling belief in his players.

“He’d say, ‘You’re my boys; you’re my boys,’” Stevenson said. “And he would say, ‘You’re going to do well against this crowd. You will do well. We’re a better football team.’ And we’d go out there just higher than a Georgia pine and just play our asses off.”

Tech finished the season 9-2, reaching No. 5 in the AP poll before losing 23-14 to No. 7 Georgia in a highly anticipated meeting (sound familiar?). True to form, the loss to the hated Bulldogs still grates nearly 60 years later.

Said Baynham, the flanker, “I remember the disappointment of losing to Georgia.”

Credit: Georgia Tech

Credit: Georgia Tech

Breland, the All-American center who lives in Bluffton, South Carolina, after a career in the engineering design field, still recalls the bad break of losing star quarterback Kim King for three games to a broken wrist. He returned for the Georgia game, perhaps rusty.

“Some of those things like that, they stick with you in your memory,” he said with a laugh. “Maybe sometimes not for a good reason.”

The year ended with a loss to Florida and Heisman Trophy winner Steve Spurrier. In February 1967, Dodd announced his retirement from coaching.

“We’re sitting in chemistry class and some guy that was on the team came in and said, ‘You are not going to believe this,’” Stevenson said.

Over the decades, not all of the 1966 team remains. But many continue to stay connected. At his retirement community in Acworth, Schroer watches games with teammates.

“We were not only teammates and classmates, but we were friends and have remained friends and close over a lot of years,” Schroer said.

The Jackets of a past, gloried age will keep watching, hoping for this team to advance even further than they did.

Said Baynham, “A day spent beating Georgia is a day well spent.”

Credit: Georgia Tech Archives

Credit: Georgia Tech Archives