By DOUG IRELAND, Journal Sports
Former LSU football coach Ed Orgeron, who played his senior season for Sam Goodwin then began his coaching career on Goodwin’s Northwestern State staff, is among speakers honoring the late coach Saturday morning at 10 in NSU’s Turpin Stadium.
The memorial service is open to anyone. Casual attire is welcomed, with NSU fans encouraged to wear football game day gear. Entrance is through the stadium’s west (press box) side.
Three of Goodwin’s greatest players – future NFL veterans Kevin Lewis and Marcus Spears, both of whom had no other college offers – and record-breaking quarterback Brad Laird are also on the roster of speakers.
Former NSU assistant coaches Dr. Fitz Hill, later a head coach at San Jose State, and Bradley Dale Peveto, who became head coach at Northwestern from 2009-12, will also talk about Goodwin.
His granddaughter Jaycee Goodwin, who last year completed her college softball career at Georgia State, will share her thoughts. She now is on the administrative staff at the University of Georgia.
Shreveport state Senator Rick Edmonds, a close Goodwin friend, will speak. Former state Senator Gerald Long, who with his late wife Rose was the longtime Fellowship of Christian Athletes huddle leader at Northwestern during Goodwin’s 17 seasons, will offer an invocation.
Resolutions from Congressman Cleo Fields, and the state houses in Louisiana and Arkansas, will be presented. Goodwin won five state championships in nine years as head coach in the 1970s at Little Rock-Parkview High School, and also was an assistant coach on Lou Holtz’ Arkansas staff for two seasons.
Goodwin passed away at home March 20 at age 82 after a brief illness.
The celebration of Goodwin’s life will lead into the annual Joe Delaney Bowl spring game that caps Northwestern’s spring practice. Goodwin launched the Delaney Bowl tradition and also inaugurated the Joe Delaney Memorial Leadership Awards for permanent team captains after Delaney’s heroic drowning death in 1983.
Following Saturday’s Delaney Bowl, the Demon Brothers Booster Club, an association of former players, most who played for Goodwin, are hosting the Crawfest festival and music show on the NSU practice fields. Tickets are available at the DemonBrothers.org website.
Goodwin won a school-record 102 games in 17 seasons at the helm of the Demon program, turning it into a perennial Southland Conference championship contender while setting the Southland Conference wins record.
A Pineville native, Goodwin led the Demons to four conference championships – the 1984 Gulf Star crown and the 1988, 1997 and 1998 Southland titles. He twice was named Southland Conference Coach of the Year.
His 1998 Demon team reached the FCS semifinals where it fell to eventual national champion UMass. That 1998 team equaled the school single-season record of 11 wins and featured four of the 22 All-Americans Goodwin coached at Northwestern.
His 1988 squad advanced to the FCS quarterfinals and is the only Northwestern team to go unbeaten in Southland play. That season, Goodwin’s “Road Warriors” picked up five straight conference or playoff wins away from Turpin Stadium, including a regular-season-ending 20-17 victory at Stephen F. Austin, which had previously been ranked No. 1 in the nation. Two weeks ahead of the win at SFA, the Demons took down another top-ranked team, North Texas, on the road.
In addition to the 20 on-field All-Americans he produced, Goodwin also coached two Academic All-Americans, a National Football Foundation Scholar-Athletes, 42 first-team All-Southland Conference selections and 38 players who reached the NFL – several whose only Division I scholarship offer was from Goodwin.
Goodwin earned induction into the N-Club Hall of Fame – the highest honor the university awards to student-athletes and athletic staff members – in 1999, a year after his alma mater, Henderson State, enshrined him in its athletic hall of fame. He was a NAIA All-America lineman for the Reddies and a three-time Arkansas Intercollegiate Conference discus champion who served 10 years as the HSU athletics director after retiring from Northwestern in June 2000.
He was inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame and the Southland Conference’s Hall of Honor in 2007. Two years ago, he was presented the “Contributions to Amateur Football Award” by the S.M. McNaughton Chapter of the National Football Foundation encompassing north Louisiana.
Complimentary bottled water will be available for those seated in the west stands at Turpin Stadium. The Goodwin family and speakers will greet well-wishers after the service at the south end of the field, next to the Jack Clayton Plaza.
Orgeron became one of the country’s top recruiters in major college football, served as interim head coach at USC, and after being promoted out of the same role in Baton Rouge following the 2016 season, led LSU to the 2019 national championship in an historic unbeaten run. His senior season at Northwestern, 1983, was Goodwin’s first in Natchitoches.
Contact Doug at sbjdoug@gmail.com