24 November 2025
By Ro Brown
Contributing Writer
Douglas Lee Williams was just a 19-year-old, true freshman quarterback who was second string until the starter sustained a mid-season injury. Heady stuff when your head coach is the legendary Eddie Robinson of Grambling State University.
When he took the field at Tulane Stadium and saw 76,753 fans in the stands, the largest crowd to witness a football contest between two black universities, he reacted with wide-eyed amazement.
“All I could say was “Wow” look at all these people!”
It was the first Bayou Classic, November 23, 1974. The Southern’s Jaguars vs. Grambling’s Tigers. Black College Football’s most storied rivalry.
The inaugural Bayou Classic might be considered the “coming out” party for the man who would go on to become the first African-American quarterback selected in the first round of the National Football League Draft by a club intent on building the franchise around his talents. Williams was selected 18th overall in the 1978 Draft by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Doug Williams was elevated to “icon” status as the first African-American quarterback to start and earn Super Bowl MVP honors when he led the Washington Redskins to victory in Super Bowl XXII in 1988.
The world’s introduction to Williams’ excellence came during the first four Bayou Classics, 1974-77.
“It was a coming out party from the standpoint of being at home. In New Orleans, 100 miles from my hometown of Zachary, Louisiana, you are not just playing in front of a lot of people, but you are playing in front of all your cousins, your Mama, your Daddy and my grandmother even made that one,” he chuckled.
Obviously, the stage was not too big for Williams. He was the most valuable player in that initial Bayou Classic, a 21-0 Grambling victory.
However, his fondest memory of that day had nothing to do with football.
“What I remember most was when I got the MVP trophy I got to take a picture with beautiful actress Gail Fisher, who played the part of the secretary on the television series ‘Mannix,” he laughed.
In some ways the Bayou Classic mirrors the professional career of Williams. After initial success, Bayou Classic II saw Williams sustain a serious knee injury in the second period of a 33-17 Grambling victory over Southern.
He says doctors told Coach Robinson the injury was career-ending. They were wrong.
Displaying the determination the world would admire 12 years later during Super Bowl XXII, Williams bounced back during his junior season winning Bayou Classic III MVP, his second MVP award in three years, before 77,188 fans in the Louisiana Superdome.
Final score of Bayou Classic III: Grambling 10 Southern 2. The young quarterback was gaining notice after completing 11 of 24 passes for 194 yards and the game’s only touchdown, a 35-yarder to wide receiver Carlos Pennywell.
Doug’s fourth and final Bayou Classic was perhaps his finest. The Tigers embarrassed their in-state rivals 55-20. And this time Bayou Classic IV was televised regionally by ABC – a rare occurrence for Black College Football.
“The country had a chance to see two Black colleges play and a chance to see Grambling and Doug Williams. I also think the Heisman voters got a chance to see him. And they probably did some research,” he added.
What they discovered was arguably the most prolific passer in the history of college football at that time. A signal caller directing an offense that scored a whopping 462 points during the season. An offense averaging 480 yards a game. A senior quarterback who tossed 38 touchdown passes in 1977.
That Bayou Classic platform, and the genius of Grambling sports information director Collie J. Nicholson, were two major reasons why Williams was voted First Team Associated Press All American, the first and still the only player from a Black college to garner such recognition.
Williams also finished fourth in the race for the Heisman Trophy in 1977 (won by Texas running back Earl Campbell), another historic accomplishment for a player from a HBCU. LSU’s Charles Alexander finished ninth on the Heisman Trophy list that season.
Sporting a 4-0 record in the Bayou Classic, and doing so before historically large crowds, Doug Williams and the Thanksgiving-week contest are intertwined. However, there’s something missing.
“For me the Bayou Classic always means coming home. I’ll always feel like I am a vital part of it. But I’m disappointed that the people who run the Bayou Classic don’t make a big deal out of the guys who’ve played in this game over more than 50 years.”
That lack of recognition was the impetus for the founding, by Williams and another Grambling great, James “Shack” Harris, of the Black College Football Hall of Fame in 2009.
He continued. “One of the things we started doing but they stopped doing was bringing back all the past MVP’s of the Bayou Classic every year. It hurts me that the two schools don’t recognize 50 years of playing this great rivalry. It’s an injustice. I think it’s on the presidents, athletic directors and sports information directors at the schools.
For Doug Williams, nothing can diminish or erase his four-year Bayou Classic experience.
“I think it’s still the grandfather of all college football classics. There are others that sometimes draw larger crowds than the Bayou Classic but if you had to grandfather somebody in, the Bayou Classic, is it.”
This article originally published in the November 24, 2025 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.