Johnny Isakson: “in 1 last minute on this day, I want to pause to pay tribute to a great Georgian and a great American, an individual we…”

“in 1 last minute on this day, I want to pause to pay tribute to a great Georgian and a great American, an individual we all lost last Friday morning in Statesboro, GA. On Friday morning of last week, 80-year-old Erskine Russell, former assistant head coach at the University of Georgia and later head coach at Georgia Southern University, died of a stroke leaving the 7-11 near his home on the way to his beloved Snooky's Restaurant in Statesboro, GA. Erskine Russell was a football coach, but he was far more than a football coach. He changed the lives of countless young men in Georgia and changed the attitude of the people of our State about higher education. Erskine Russell was a man who led the University of Georgia and its defense in 1980 to the national championship. Then, a few years later, he got the opportunity at a fledgling Georgia college--Georgia Southern--to establish a football team. He went there and went to the local sporting goods store and bought a football. He took a drainage ditch that ran by the field and named it the ``wonderful, beautiful Eagle Creek,'' and slowly but surely he recruited young men to come to Georgia Southern to play football. Within a few years, Georgia Southern went from just having a program to being a national champion. And he repeated that national championship again.…”