Football To Face Jackson State Saturday Afternoon In Mississippi

Football 11/5/2021 10:00:00 AM TSU Sports Information

• Texas Southern is back on the road for a showdown at Jackson State on Saturday afternoon at Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium for a 1 p.m. kickoff.

• TSU ended a two-game slide with an impressive 59-17 win over Arkasnas-Pine Bluff. TSU scored its most points in a SWAC game since 2015. A contest featuring two of the SWAC’s top quarterbacks will also take place as TSU’s Andrew Body will square off against JSUs Shedeur Sanders. Both are true freshmen.

• TSU will face Jackson State for the first time since 2016 and first time in Jackson since 2015. Since the SWAC started divisional play in 1999 both teams have only met 15 times.

• TSU defensive end Demontario Anderson will have a homecoming as he was born and attended school in Jackson, Miss. before moving to Texas.

• Saturday’s contest will feature live audio on KTSU 90.9 FM and broadcast on Jackson State Sports Network.

• TSU will have two of its final three games on the road.

• The SWAC opted for a spring schedule due to uncertainties surrounding COVID-19 last fall. TSU could only get two games in due to COVID-19 protocols surrounding the opposing team or at TSU. The contest against Baylor marked the first time TSU played back-to-back weekends since the final two weekends of November 2019. 

• JSU was picked third in the SWAC East Preseason poll but has defied expectations under first-year head coach Deion Sanders as they lead the SWAC East with an undefeated record. The Tigers control their own destiny in terms of the SWAC Championship.

• JSU is the SWAC’s third-ranked scoring team with 29.4 points per game and averages 345.3 yards of total offense (8th). The team is led by its defensive unit which leads the SWAC with 239 yards per contest.

•  Jackson State head coach Deion Sanders has missed the past few games due to foot surgery. JSU is led by interim head coach Gary Harrell, a former assistant coach at TSU and also features another former TSU assistant on staff in T.C. Taylor.

•  TSU is looking for its fourth win of the season as the Tigers haven’t won four games since 2016.

• TSU’s roster is a full of youth in key areas as 58 players are either true or redshirt freshmen.

• The Tigers feature a third-year head coach in Clarence McKinney. A Houston native, McKinney attended high school across the street at Jack Yates High School and played collegiately at Montana State and the University of Mary. He also served as head coach at Yates before joining the staffs at Houston, Texas A&M and Arizona.

• Clarence McKinney is the 17th head coach in the history of Texas Southern Football. McKinney has a task ahead as the program has only had 28 winning seasons in 75 years of existence and hasn’t recorded a winning season since 2000. 

• McKinney won as a student at Yates High School and helped the University of Mary post three winning seasons as a student-athlete in college which made school history. As head coach at Yates, McKinney posted a mark of 30-8 over three years before moving on to the collegiate ranks as an assistant. As an assistant at Houston, Texas A&M and Arizona, McKinney has only experienced three losing seasons in his 11 years of collegiate coaching.