How the University of Georgia helped Coastal Carolina Create a Football Program

As many of you know, Coastal Carolina has only been playing football at the varsity level since 2003. In only 8 years, they have won 4 Big South Conference championships and currently have 4 former players in the NFL. But most Georgia fans may not know that Coastal Carolina may not have developed a varsity football team without the help of the University of Georgia.

In 1987, Coastal Carolina was a small school that was a member of the University of South Carolina system of school. The school colors at the time were red and black, similar to the garnet and black worn by their parent school. That fall, the school would field its first football team, all be it on a club level with Georgia native Andy Lanier as coach. With limited funding, Coach Lanier reached out to both South Carolina and Clemson about donating old equipment for the team to use that fall. Both schools were unable to help, but another school stepped into to help the new team out.

That school was The University of Georgia, who gave them used helmets and shoulder pads. And since they were wearing red black, just like UGA, there was little need to spend extra money redoing the colors on the helmets. As a thank you gesture, the club team would call themselves the Coastal Carolina Bulldogs, instead of the school's traditional mascot, the Chanticleers. The success of the club team, and some funding from alumni, helped Coastal Carolina build new facilities that would eventually allow them to create their varsity football program.