Bill Curry appreciates how important football is to Americans.
Curry -- a 10-year NFL center who later coached at Georgia Tech, Alabama and Kentucky -- recalled a conversation Monday at the Little Rock Touchdown Club at the DoubleTree Hotel that he had with a man in Alabama two days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks .
The man asked Curry whether Alabama was going to play its game against Southern Miss on that Saturday. Curry told him that the Alabama game was postponed because of the attacks in New York, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C.
That news didn't affect the man, Curry said. Instead, he was not shy about telling Curry that the high school football team in Attalla, Ala., still was going to play.
"Let me tell you something, coach," Curry recalled the man saying. "Come Friday night in Attalla, Alabama, we're going to play football because it means a lot to us.
"I felt like he slapped me in the mouth. I was in an emotional state. We were all in an emotional state. We had been attacked. Over 3,000 citizens were dead and gone. I asked God, why does it matter if they play a football game in Attalla, Alabama. It came to me as I went home.
"I know this. I know that Friday night is the time when America huddles over a million young people playing football. Friday night is when we huddle, and we're sitting together in the stands. Your child scores a touchdown, I'm going to hug you if he's on my team. I don't care what color your skin is. If we could learn at 11 a.m. on Sunday morning what we know at 8 p.m. on a Friday night, we would be a different country."
Curry, 77, touched on his playing and coaching career Monday.
When he was in the NFL, Curry played for Vince Lombardi at Green Bay and Don Shula with the Baltimore Colts. He said that his dream was to pitch for the New York Yankees, but Curry got into football as a child in College Park, Ga., then went on to play at Georgia Tech and in the NFL.
The influence of Lombardi and Shula resonates with Curry.
"My life was changed by Vince Lombardi," Curry said. "He would not tolerate one word of racism on that team. Don Shula would not tolerate of racism.
"They didn't do it because they could win. They did it because it was the right thing to do."
Also on Monday, the sixth annual James Street Award was presented to Pulaski Academy's Kendall Pickett.
Thirteen players were nominated for the award, including Pickett, Little Rock Central's Kylan Jones, Little Rock Fair's DaJuan Robinson, Little Rock Hall's Jacob Jordan, Little Rock McClellan's Ben King, Little Rock Parkview's Favian Delph, Joe T. Robinson's Deunte Moody, Mills' Wesley Guy, Baptist Prep's Brooks Brown, Episcopal Collegiate's JP Braunfisch, Little Rock Catholic's Collins Olaimey, Little Rock Christian's Akeem Gilmore and Deuce Carter of Southwest Christian Academy.
The award, named for the late quarterback at the University of Texas, honors a football player at a Little Rock high school who exhibits outstanding sportsmanship toward teammates, coaches and opponents.
Pickett said he plans on attending the University of Central Arkansas and wants to work in the medical field. He said he was excited to win the Street Award.
"It means I'm doing something right with the way I present myself. People have noticed that," Pickett said. "That makes me want to continue to be the person that I am and strive to be someone that people can be proud to be around."
Sports on 11/26/2019