April 19, 2010
Greensboro, Ga. – Vanderbilt’s Bobby Johnson is one of 12 NCAA head coaches entered in the annual Chick-fil-A Bowl Challenge charity golf tournament starting on April 27 at the prestigious Reynolds Plantation resort in Georgia.
Johnson will team with former Vanderbilt and NBA basketball center Will Perdue for the second consecutive year.
“I can’t wait for participate again with Will in this event,” Johnson said. “Chick-fil-A and the tournament organizers do a first-class job with this tournament. And best of all, all Will and I have to do to participate in the scholarship money for Vanderbilt is tee it up.
“Last year was the first time Will and I had played together, so that experience should help us even more this year. Hopefully, we can play great and collect even more money toward scholarships,” Johnson added.
Head football coaches and former athletes from universities across the South, including Southeastern Conference members Vanderbilt, Alabama, Mississippi State and South Carolina, will compete for $400,000 in scholarships in the celebrity tournament held over three days at the Lake Oconee resort south of Atlanta.
Besides the Vanderbilt duo of Johnson and Perdue, the field of participants includes Nick Saban and Steve Sloan, Alabama; Dabo Swinney and Dwight Clark, Clemson; Jimbo Fisher and Terrell Buckley, Florida State; Paul Johnson and Jon Barry, Georgia Tech; Ralph Friedgen and Stan Gelbaugh, Maryland; Houston Nutt and Wesley Walls, Ole Miss; Butch Davis and Natrone Means, North Carolina; Tom O’Brien and Sidney Lowe, North Carolina State; Steve Spurrier and Sterling Sharpe, South Carolina; Frank Beamer and Dell Curry, Virginia Tech; and Jim Grobe and Billy Packer, Wake Forest.
The complete field of former athletes and celebrities includes four Heisman Trophy winners, 10 members of the College Football Hall of Fame, 20 All-Americans, six Coach of the Year winners, four NFL Hall of Famers and players totaling 51 NFL All-Pro or Pro Bowl selections.
“From a golf standpoint, this might be the strongest field we’ve ever had in this tournament,” said Gary Stokan, Chick-fil-A Bowl president and CEO. “Not only are they highly competitive on the football field, but they are ultra competitive when competing for this championship – especially with our largest scholarship purse yet on the line.”
Recent tournament winners include South Carolina in 2009 (Spurrier/Sharpe /-12, playoff winners) and 2008 (Spurrier/Sharpe /-12), and Virginia Tech in 2007 (Beamer/Curry /-10).
In addition to the $400,000 scholarship purse, additional proceeds will be donated to selected charities including Chick-fil-A’s WinShape Homes. The Chick-fil-A Bowl Challenge is a significant contributor to the Chick-fil-A Bowl’s overall charitable and scholarship donations. The Chick-fil-A Bowl leads all bowls in the country in charitable giving, including gifts of more than $5.8 million since 2002.
The tournament is being taped by ESPN for broadcast in the fall. The date of the broadcast will be announced this summer.
For more information on the event, visit www.Chick-fil-ABowlChallenge.com.
