Author: Frank Murtaugh

Frank Murtaugh is the managing editor of Memphis magazine. He's covered sports for the Flyer for two decades. "From My Seat" debuted on the Flyer site in 2002 and "Tiger Blue" in 2009.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Tiger Hoops Scandal? Ho-hum.

Malcolm Dandridge (photo by Wes Hale)

Larry Kenon is a certifiable Memphis basketball legend. In his one season as a Tiger (1972-73), Kenon established a single-season rebound record (501) that will never be touched. He helped another Larry legend (Finch) lead Memphis State to the NCAA championship game, where the Tigers fell to mighty UCLA. Kenon’s number 35 is among ten retired numbers that now hang from the rafters at FedExForum on Tiger game days.

A detail you might now know about Larry Kenon: Among the conditions he insisted upon before committing to the Tiger program: He didn’t have to attend a class. (I was three years old in 1972, but I have this nugget from a reliable source who was near the program for that unforgettable season.)

The Tigers won their biggest conference game of the season Sunday afternoon at FedExForum, beating FAU, 78-74. But they did so without one of only two players still on the team from FAU’s upset of Memphis in last year’s NCAA tournament. Center Malcolm Dandridge sat out the game as the university investigates chatter of academic misdeeds involving the fifth-year senior. It’s a deflating cloud over a program that has reached the heights of a Top-10 ranking and the lows of a four-game losing streak this winter. But you know what? These cloud conditions are part of Memphis Tiger basketball, every bit as much as the blue and gray of their uniforms.

If you’re too young for memories of Larry Kenon, perhaps you recall Keith Lee, the record-shattering power forward from West Memphis who became a Tiger in 1981 upon receiving a shoebox — between a size seven-and-a-half and a nine, according to Lee himself — full of cash. You’ve likely forgotten the Tic Price tryst. Finch’s successor as Tiger coach resigned abruptly before the 1999-2000 season when he was discovered to have been playing some bedroom ball with a U of M student. It’s easy to forget this scandal, as all it cost Memphis was a mediocre coach.

Arguably the greatest team in Tiger history reached the championship game in 2008, but there’s no banner to celebrate the squad because star freshman Derrick Rose, the NCAA determined, had someone else take the standardized test that qualified him to play at Memphis. James Wiseman was the most heralded freshman to suit up for the Tigers since Rose, but played in only three games early in the 2019-20 season before the NCAA ruled he had taken improper payments from his future coach — Penny Hardaway — when his family moved to Memphis before his senior year at East High School. And just last November, Hardaway served a three-game suspension for what the NCAA deemed an improper recruiting visit. 

It’s exhausting to read all together, isn’t it? One ugly “distraction” after another, almost as regular for the Memphis program as visits to the Sweet 16. Making the current Dandridge matter especially troubling: The player is as Memphis as Hardaway, no import (like Kenon, Rose, or even Lee, from West Memphis). Dandridge surely has a sense of those historic “clouds.” If not, the man who coached him at East and now for five years at the U of M could certainly draw a picture.

Maybe it’s all a misunderstanding. Maybe it was one or two bad decisions made by one young man, and the problem can be sliced cleanly from the larger basketball system this city celebrates and its favorite son, Hardaway, manages. Hardaway had little to say about the matter following Sunday’s win: “I’m gonna learn as [everyone else] learns.” And that’s a component to the problem: If Hardaway truly knows nothing about a fifth-year player breaking rules, the coach is part of that problem.

FedExForum splashed an awkward promotion on the scoreboard and concourse screens as fans departed Sunday’s game. “Senior Day” will be celebrated when the Tigers host UAB on March 3rd. The player staring from those screens, representative of this year’s Memphis senior class: Malcolm Dandridge. The guess here is that a Dandridge appearance for Senior Day is a 50/50 proposition, at best. 

The Tigers have now won 20 games under Hardaway in each of the coach’s six seasons. Feels like something to celebrate, especially in an up-and-down campaign. But with the scent of scandal in the air? We pause the celebration. Yet again.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Memory Makers

David Jones leads the AAC in scoring (photo by Wes Hale).

When the University of Memphis hired Penny Hardaway to coach its basketball program in 2018, his task was to make Tiger hoops meaningful again, to make Tiger seasons memorable. (What stands out in your memory from the four seasons prior to Hardaway taking over? See how this works?) Hardaway’s first five seasons went well by some measures and fell short of expectations by others. But each, in its own way, was memorable. Which begs the question as March nears: How will the Tigers’ 2023-24 season stand out for local hoop historians? For context, a brief review of the Coach Penny era, seasons 1 through 5.

2018-19: The Year of Jeremiah

Before this season, no Tiger had ever scored 40 points in two different games. Jeremiah Martin did so in the same month (February). A player who averaged 2.7 points per game as a freshman under coach Josh Pastner became the fifth to score 700 in a single season (19.7 average). The pride of Mitchell High School made a mediocre (22-14) season unforgettable.

2019-20: The Year of Our Precious

Many in these parts remember this season as The Year Without Wiseman. The mighty NCAA decided Hardaway had violated rules in his recruiting of James Wiseman, leading to a suspension of the player and eventually his departure from the program. But let’s accentuate the positive. The team’s “other” five-star recruit, Precious Achiuwa, averaged 15.8 points and 10.8 rebounds and became the first Tiger to earn Player of the Year honors in the American Athletic Conference. The season ended prematurely with the Covid shutdown, so we’ll never know if that team (21-10) may have rallied in the AAC tourney for a bid to the Big Dance. But again, one player made the season rather remarkable.

2020-21: A National Title (Sorta)

Empty arenas and a team that couldn’t seem to decide its star. Landers Nolley? Boogie Ellis? Lester Quinones? A six-game winning streak late in the season wasn’t enough to get the Tigers into the NCAA tournament, so they headed to a slimmed-down NIT in north Texas. And they won the darn thing, beating Mississippi State in the final for the program’s second NIT crown. Did it fill a void? Meet Hardaway’s expectations? No and no. Did it make for a memorable ending to a pandemic-heavy winter of Tiger basketball? Emphatically yes.

2021-22: Dancing Days Return

This team beat a pair of Top-10 squads (Alabama and Houston) on its way to the program’s first NCAA tournament since 2014. Freshman Jalen Duren (12.0 points, 8.0 rebounds) played his way into the first round of the NBA draft and the Tigers gave top-ranked Gonzaga all it could handle in the second round of the NCAAs. A season that felt like Hardaway and the Tigers were on the right path.

2022-23: The Year of KD

After transferring from SMU, point guard Kendric Davis led the AAC in both scoring (21.9) and assists (5.4), somehow falling short in the league’s Player of the Year voting. Better yet, Davis helped the Tigers knock off top-ranked Houston — the first such upset in program history — and win their first AAC tournament. An overlooked timeout near the end of their clash with FAU in the opening round of the NCAA tournament ended the season prematurely. Davis became the second player to put up 700 points in a season under Hardaway.

How will we remember the current season when all is said and done? As of now, it’s The Midseason Massacre, a four-game losing streak that, in rasslin’ terms, knocked a Top-10 team entirely out of the ring. David Jones leads the AAC in scoring and is the kind of player who could help Memphis make a run in the conference tournament next month. It’s a good time for Tiger fans to remember basketball memories aren’t born but made.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Talented Teasers?

Penny Hardaway (Credit: Wes Hale)

Are the Memphis Tigers a legitimate Top-10 team, Final Four contenders? Or are they the biggest teasers east of the Dallas Cowboys? Nineteen games into the 2023-24 season, it seems the answer to one of these questions will ultimately be in the affirmative.

Sunday’s loss at Tulane — the Green Wave’s first upset of a Top-25 team since the Clinton presidency — changed the Tigers’ season, and compounded last Thursday’s loss at home to USF. A team that started the week undefeated in a less-than-respected American Athletic Conference now has a two-game losing streak and, worse, merely 12 regular-season games left to improve its resume for those who hand out seeds for the NCAA tournament. Memphis, you might note, has never reached the Sweet 16 seeded lower than sixth.

Last Thursday night at FedExForum could have been an anomalous nadir. With the arena virtually empty — the university publicly urged fans to stay home and off the icy roads — Memphis looked all of its number-10 ranking in taking a 20-point lead into the second half. Then they seemed to hit black ice as a unit and allowed USF to storm back, tie the game with less than a minute to play, and win the contest on a Kasean Pryor free throw with five seconds to play. (There’s brutal irony in a team from South Florida knocking off the Tigers while fans were home dripping their faucets.) The Tigers’ late-game hero Jahvon Quinerly committed a turnover in the game’s closing seconds and missed a desperation three-point attempt at the buzzer. If empty seats could boo, they would have.

The loss was especially bizarre, as it came four days after Memphis looked like their predecessors from 2008 or 1985, both Final Four years. The Tigers scored 112 points in beating Wichita State, the most on the road for this program in 69 years. Against USF, they couldn’t crack 80. The Tigers drained 19 three-pointers in overwhelming the Shockers, a program record. Against the Bulls, they missed 22 of their 28 shots from long range. Memphis lost despite outscoring USF 42-18 in the paint and 21-2(!) on fast breaks. The numbers don’t make sense, but the loss is permanent and will cost Memphis its spot in that hallowed Top 10.

As long as Quinerly and David Jones remain healthy, the Tigers will enter March with an arsenal most teams — “power conference” or otherwise — would envy. Jones (21.7 points per game) is the leading candidate for AAC Player of the Year. Right behind him may well be Quinerly (14.0 points, 4.7 assists). Were it not for Quinerly’s game-winning treys against Tulsa and SMU, the Tigers might have a losing record in league play. Jones took a three-point shot that could have won Sunday’s game at Tulane. He missed, as stars sometimes do. How will the Tigers process two straight gut punches as they wait a week before returning to play (Sunday at UAB)?

Following the Tigers’ narrow escape against SMU on January 7th, Hardaway emphasized the joy he took in seeing his team improve while winning. Beats the “learn from our losses” track every day of the week. And the Tigers are certainly better for their recent 10-game winning streak. But Hardaway also suggested this group of veteran transfers may actually be too confident, that they feel like any obstacle or deficit can be overcome, and this can sometimes compromise group effort. A home loss to a team with a NET rating of 146, you gotta believe, might help reduce that overconfidence intangible.

Another intangible to track with these Tigers: team chemistry. Following the USF loss, Hardaway suggested internal strife was impacting who he could put on the floor and when. If this is the case (more than two months into the season), the likelihood of a full recovery — let alone a Final Four run — seems remote. The sixth-year coach may have the greatest challenge of his career on his hands: Getting the most out of a talented team before the players on that team sabotage the mission. That would be a cruel tease, indeed.

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From My Seat Sports

Sports Legacy Award: Ozzie Smith

photo by Taka Yanagimoto

Hall of Fame shortstop Ozzie Smith is one of four 2024 recipients of the National Civil Rights Museum’s Sports Legacy Award. Along with Alex English, Calvin Hill, and Renee Montgomery, Smith will be saluted before and during the Memphis Grizzlies’ game against the Golden State Warriors on Martin Luther King Day.

Congratulations on the Sports Legacy Award. You’re only the second baseball legend (after Willie Mays) to receive this honor.

I guess I’m treading in tall cotton. Any honor you get from outside your sport or business . . . I feel blessed and honored. To be included with people who are doing something outside of what they’re known for.

You were born in Mobile, Alabama, and you were in Los Angeles as a child during the Watts Riots. What comes to mind when you think of Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement?

Dr. King and so many others — Andrew Young, Ralph Abernathy — had the courage to stand up and allow us as African Americans to achieve the things we were able to achieve. The fight continues today. It hasn’t ended. There’s a lot of whitewashing going on right now, as we speak. I think of the trials and tribulations: the water hoses, dogs, the pain. Everything the people who came before us had to suffer to get us to this point . . . I take my hat off to people who are willing to continue the fight. Though we’ve come a long way, we still have a long way to go.

Do you have distinct memories of April 4, 1968? You were 13 years old when we lost Dr. King.

When you have a leader like that, his impact was so powerful. Anytime you have a leader like Dr. King succumb to assassination, it has a profound effect on your life, from that point forward. You have visions of where it happened, how it happened. I’ll get the chance to walk in that space [this weekend]. I’m sure it’s very touching.

Memphis has been Cardinals country for generations, but officially since 1998 when the Triple-A Redbirds began play here. Do you get to the Bluff City at all? Have you visited the National Civil Rights Museum?

I’ve been to Memphis, but I haven’t had the opportunity to visit the museum. This will be my first time.

You’re currently president of the PGA REACH Gateway Foundation. What can you share about that program?

I retired in 1996, and for anyone who plays sports for 20 or 25 years, you’re looking for that next challenge. There’s a competitive void in your life, and I gravitated to golf. I fell in love with it so quickly. Growing up in Southern California, I never had the opportunity to pick up a golf club. It was always baseball, basketball, or football. When I was asked to be president of the St. Louis chapter [of PGA REACH], I didn’t know what that entailed.

Exposing kids not just to the game of golf, but the business of golf is a great way for them to learn discipline in life, honesty. It was through that prism that I could give kids opportunities they otherwise wouldn’t have. 

We’ve also taken on the challenge of giving veterans their lives back. As I look back on my career, the thing you miss the most is camaraderie, being with the guys. I think it’s the same thing with soldiers: you miss the people you’ve spent the majority of your time with. A lot of these guys have PTSD. PGA HOPE helps give them their lives back, and that’s just as important as giving young kids a new experience. We’re in the process of building a facility near the grounds of the old Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis. I’m very proud to be a part of this. 

There are much fewer Black players in Major League Baseball today than when you debuted in 1978. Are there steps baseball can take to better engage young Black athletes?

It will take the work of a lot of people. Most of the [development] focus these days is in Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and the islands. There’s not as much red tape. We have programs here, trying to get more [African-American] kids interested. But there has to be a lot more money to get it back to the level it was in the late Sixties or early Seventies. I don’t have all the answers, but there has to be a lot more interest to get it back to the level it should be. HBCUs may be the way. Get the numbers back up. There are talented African Americans, but they don’t have the guidance or vehicle to elevate [their skills].

The Cardinals finished in last place in 2023, the first time in over three decades. What must the club do to regain its footing and return to the World Series?

It’s a real challenge to get back to prominence. You gotta pitch, you gotta hit, you gotta throw and catch. I think analytics have had a lot to do with some teams forgetting what is the heartbeat of the organization. The minor-league system has always been a big part of success for the Cardinals, the Dodgers. We need to get back to refurbishing the minor-league system, so it becomes that lifeline, allowing young guys to learn the game, and be ready when they reach the big leagues.

You’re generally considered the greatest fielding shortstop in baseball history. If there’s one fielding tip you had to share for posterity, what would it be?

I actually learned this through golf: stagnation is a killer. A baseball player can’t get started until the pitcher releases the ball. That’s where the hitter finds his rhythm, as the pitcher goes into his wind-up. As a fielder, you don’t want to be in a stagnated position. You want some type of movement, be it left, right. Some type of swaying movement that allows you to get into the flow for a ground ball or fly ball.


Ozzie Smith won 13 Gold Gloves over his 19-year career with the San Diego Padres and St. Louis Cardinals. He played in three World Series for the Cardinals and won the 1982 championship. His uniform number 1 was retired by St. Louis in 1996 and he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2002.He is one of nine former Cardinals honored with a statue outside Busch Stadium.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Memphis Wins AutoZone Liberty Bowl

Seth Henigan, MVP of the 2023 AutoZone Liberty Bowl (photo by Wes Hale)

Under a sky as gray as the trim on their uniforms, the Memphis Tigers made some local football history at the 65th AutoZone Liberty Bowl.  In beating Iowa State, 36-26, Friday afternoon at Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium, Memphis reached 10 wins in a season for only the fifth time in program history (and the fourth since 2014). The 2023 Tigers go into the record books as only the second to win 10 games and finish the season with a bowl victory, joining the 2014 squad.

The victory in its home stadium was the eighth postseason win in 16 games for Memphis, and crowned the Tigers champions of the oldest, most prestigious bowl game among those eight. The win serves as a measure of revenge for a loss the Tigers absorbed against the Cyclones in the 2017 AutoZone Liberty Bowl.

“108 years of Memphis football,” emphasized Tiger coach Ryan Silverfield after his third bowl victory in four years atop the program. “To be the fifth team ever to win 10 games . . . It’s been an absolute honor to coach this wonderful group of young men. They’ve gone through so many trials and tribulations, but they continue to persevere.”

Junior quarterback Seth Henigan earned MVP honors by tossing four touchdown passes and rushing for a fifth. His 70-yard strike to DeMeer Blankumsee on the third play of the game put the Tigers up in a contest they led for 58:41 out of 60 minutes of game action. Henigan’s 51-yard connection with Joe Scates made the score 19-0 before the end of the first quarter. The Cyclones closed within six points (19-13) late in the second quarter, but a Tanner Gillis field goal made it 22-13 at halftime. A pair of Henigan touchdown passes in the third quarter made the margin 36-13, enough to earn Memphis its first win over a “Power 5” program in 2023.

In passing for 364 yards, Henigan surpassed Brady White to establish a new career record for Memphis with 10,764 yards. He also became the first Tiger quarterback to complete 300 passes in a single season. Henigan intends to return for a fourth season in 2024.

“Our players expected to win the football game,” said Silverfield. “We knew who our opponent was. We cranked it up. Our players had full confidence in themselves.”

Both Henigan and the Tigers’ defensive player of the game — linebacker Chandler Martin — acknowledged aggravation at their team being a 10.5-point underdog against the Cyclones. “I took it personal,” said Henigan. Martin showed just how personal he took things by making five tackles behind the line of scrimmage, almost half his total (12) for the season entering the game. Martin’s heroics helped the Memphis defense hold Iowa State to zero rushing yards, a first for the Tiger program in 30 years. Memphis added another pair of zeroes to a remarkable postgame stat sheet: zero penalties and zero turnovers.

“Zero rushing yards [allowed] is a feat in any game,” noted Henigan, “but especially in a bowl game, against a good Big 12 opponent. The coaching staff preached the opportunity to have a 10-win season. That’s what we were playing for. Our guys knew that. This was a huge win, going into the offseason and recruiting.”

Silverfield likes to emphasize a word he put on the back of t-shirts way back in August, before temperatures cooled and the heat of a 12-game regular season rose: “finish.” Having finished the 2023 season as strongly as any team in the program’s history, the coach relished positive steps toward an “ultimate goal” he says the team still hasn’t achieved. “This season was unique,” he said, “as we found ways to win games that maybe in the past we hadn’t. We found ways to finish. College football has changed so much, but it’s still about building a program, and doing it the right way. My number-one job is to serve these young men. And that’s not going to change. This was a great way to put a ribbon on a fantastic season.”

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Opinion The Last Word

End of Regulation

Redbirds shortstop Masyn Winn (Photo: Memphis Redbirds)

How will 2023 be remembered by Memphis sports buffs in, say, 2033? What will stick on the ever-growing timeline of games we play and cheer in the Bluff City?

Let’s start with the good stuff. The Memphis Grizzlies posted an impressive 51-31 record on their way to a second consecutive Southwest Division championship. (How about a banner or two at FedExForum? Let’s get this done.) Forward Jaren Jackson Jr. led the NBA in blocks for a second straight season and earned Defensive Player of the Year honors, only the second Memphis player to take home that prestigious piece of hardware.

On the college level, Penny Hardaway’s Tigers reached the NCAA tournament a second straight year and made some history on the way. In beating Houston to win the American Athletic Conference tournament, the Tigers earned their first victory over a team ranked number-one in the country. Guard Kendric Davis should stick on that timeline of memories having led the AAC in both scoring and assists in his lone season as a Tiger.

Kendric Davis led the AAC in scoring and assists. (Photo: Larry Kuzniewski)

Those who follow Memphis Redbirds baseball will remember 2023 for one of the top prospects in the sport, shortstop Masyn Winn. The speed demon with a cannon on his right shoulder set a franchise record with 99 runs scored before a late-season promotion to the St. Louis Cardinals. Then there was slugger Luken Baker. The big first baseman slammed 33 home runs and drove in 98 runs in only 84 games, figures so eye-popping that Baker was named International League MVP at season’s end, the first Redbird in franchise history to receive a league’s top honor.

Alas, none of those news items stole the national spotlight in the way Ja Morant managed … and it wasn’t the All-Star’s heroics on the hardwood. After a Grizzlies loss to the Nuggets in early March, Morant flashed a handgun on social media from a Denver nightclub. The images were disturbing enough to cost Morant the next nine games on the Memphis schedule.

Morant returned to action and put up 45 points in a playoff loss to the Lakers, a reminder of just how high his ceiling could be, but he fell back to Earth, and dramatically, when another gun-toting video surfaced shortly after the Grizzlies’ season ended in Los Angeles. After weeks of deliberation, NBA commissioner Adam Silver handed Morant a 25-game suspension, punishment that would delay the start of Morant’s fifth professional season until late December. Minus Morant and injured center Steven Adams, the Grizzlies went 6-19 over the course of the suspension. For Mid-South NBA fans, 2024 can’t get here soon enough.

Sports are unique in the way our favorite teams and athletes so directly impact a day’s mood. There are football fans in Memphis who gained from the return (after 38 years!) of the USFL’s Memphis Showboats. Affordable tickets to pro football — even in the heat of June — are mood-lifters, to say the least. Our soccer outfit, 901 FC, put together another playoff season in the USL Championship, even as attendance at AutoZone Park sagged from the heights of the club’s 2019 debut season. But a mood-lifter on game night for soccer buffs? Check.

All of this makes Morant’s off-court troubles the kind a fan base suffers most, because Morant the basketball player takes us places no other man in Grizzlies history has taken us. (Recall that Morant made second-team All-NBA before his 23rd birthday.) When poor decisions weigh down Morant the human being, it shifts the fan/athlete perspective into one centered more on compassion than any form of adrenaline-fueled elation.

Let’s remember 2023 for the victories we had, and we had a few. And let’s hope we remember 2023 for the year this town’s most famous athlete became a new kind of hero.

Frank Murtaugh is the managing editor of Memphis Magazine. He writes the columns “From My Seat” and “Tiger Blue” for the Flyer.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Coach Hardaway’s Time

Penny Hardaway (photo by Wes Hale)

When does a college basketball coach earn the word era? I mean truly earn it? Tubby Smith may have won a national title at Kentucky, but his two seasons with Memphis don’t constitute an era. What about the seven years Josh Pastner coached the Tigers? Era or no era? (It was not an era.)

For me, the Penny Hardaway Era of Tiger basketball arrived Saturday afternoon at FedExForum, when Memphis beat the 13th-ranked Clemson Tigers without playing its best basketball. The win came six days after beating another Top-25 team (Texas A&M) on the road and barely three weeks after beating another Top-25 team (Arkansas) in the Bahamas. Upon his arrival in 2018, Hardaway famously asked for “all the smoke,” boldly asserting the Tiger basketball brand before he’d coached his first game at the college level. Three seasons later, his Tigers won a bizarre, pandemic-restricted NIT in Texas. Then last March, his Tigers won the American Athletic Conference tournament by beating the top-ranked team in the country (Houston), a first for the Memphis program. But those moments were prelims. The Hardaway Era is finally upon us.

Consider, for a moment, the teams that visited Memphis in December 2017, Smith’s final season at the helm: Mercer, Samford, Bryant, Albany, Siena, Loyola, LSU. The Tigers won six of those seven games … but who cared? (They finished that month with a 34-point loss at Cincinnati.) It was a dreadfully low point in the proud history of Tiger basketball.

Cut to this season and the schedule Hardaway acknowledged as having drawn up “blindly,” not knowing the composition of his roster when the games were booked: five teams from the SEC before Christmas, two from the hallowed ACC, Michigan, and Villanova. This isn’t just boosting a non-conference schedule for those who rank teams and hand out NCAA tournament bids. This is imposing oneself on the sport. It’s bullying the very notion that Memphis is from a lesser league, a tier below the national-title contenders. As it turns out, Hardaway himself is bringing the smoke. Can his peers and rivals handle it? (Following Saturday’s game, Clemson coach Brad Brownell said, “Penny must be secure in his job to draw up the schedule he has.”)

Memphis handed Clemson its first loss in 10 games despite not playing stellar basketball. In the team’s first home game since November 17th, the visitors raced out to an 11-2 lead. Hardaway’s troops never found their shooting touch, missing 22 of 26 three-point attempts. (Hardaway insisted his team “did not take one bad shot against the zone.” They just missed them.) But Memphis played sound defense, forcing 15 turnovers, and got to the foul line, hitting 17 of 23 free throws. Star forward David Jones led all scorers with 22 points, but even he missed three free throws late to make the result tighter than it had to be. A huge win for Memphis, and not their best. Not yet.

A spot in the Top 25 is coming. “Out of anyone in the country, I feel like we really had to earn [a ranking],” said Hardaway after the victory. “I know what it’s gonna take for us: to keep learning, to keep winning. We haven’t even scratched the surface. There’s room to grow.” As of Sunday, Memphis had climbed to 34th in the NCAA NET ratings, higher than a few programs you’ve heard of: North Carolina, Gonzaga, Villanova. With another Top-25 foe (Virginia) visiting Tuesday, the Tigers will have another chance to impress AP voters and such. Vanderbilt — an eighth “Power 5” opponent — will be here Saturday.

A college player can establish an era in as few as two seasons. Penny Hardaway did so as an All-American guard for Memphis State (1991-93). It’s taken six seasons (three decades later), but the Coach Penny Hardaway Era in Memphis is here, and in full force. Winter is coming for the American Athletic Conference.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Three Thoughts on Bowl-bound Tigers

Seth Henigan (Credit: Wes Hale)

The Memphis Tigers are staying home for bowl season, and they’re perfectly happy to save on the holiday travel expenses. In a rematch of the 2017 AutoZone Liberty Bowl, Memphis will face Iowa State of the Big 12 on December 29th in the stadium the Tigers have called home since 1965. (A slot opened for Memphis when the SEC fell one team shy of qualifiers for its bowl commitments.) This makes ten consecutive bowl seasons for the Memphis program, and the Tigers will have a chance to win ten games for only the fifth time. The Cyclones will come to town with a record of 7-5 (6-2 in the Big 12). In that 2017 clash, Iowa State beat the Tigers, 21-20, in front of 58,318 fans. Kickoff is scheduled for 2:30 p.m. and the game will be televised nationally on ESPN.

It’s a good time to remember the AutoZone Liberty Bowl will be played for the 65th time, the eighth-oldest bowl game on the college football calendar. It may not be among the “New Year’s Six” when it comes to prestige, but it’s on the next tier, and has been the stage for some unforgettable players: Archie Manning, Bo Jackson, Doug Flutie, and Dak Prescott to name just four. Last year’s three-overtime epic between Arkansas and Kansas was among the four or five best games of the season. Here’s hoping for the right kind of new memories later this month.

• Memphis quarterback Seth Henigan has announced he’ll return for a fourth season in blue and gray. In the age of the “transfer portal” — essentially free agency for every player on every team after every season — Henigan’s devotion to the Tiger program is rather astounding. And his return, by itself, gives the 2024 team the scent of a contender. A second-team all-conference selection this season, Henigan has passed for 3,519 yards and 28 touchdowns, with only 9 interceptions. He needs only 291 yards to break Brady White’s program record of 10,690 yards (something we could see in the Liberty Bowl), and 16 touchdowns to top White’s record of 90. The Henigan number I’ll be watching closest: 22, his number of wins as the Memphis quarterback. With health and success, he could become the first Tiger signal caller to top 30 wins for his career (White won 28). Henigan should become only the third player to lead Memphis in passing four consecutive years, joining Lloyd Patterson (1975-78) and Danny Wimprine (2001-04).

• There is some grumbling in social-media circles that the Tigers’ 9-3 record somehow isn’t good enough. Memphis didn’t beat the teams it needed to for a conference championship (Tulane, SMU) and escaped with wins over programs it should beat handily (North Texas, Charlotte). To this I have a brief response: horse hockey. A win in the Liberty Bowl would give the Tiger program its fifth 10-win campaign (and fourth since 2014, a single decade). Those with short memories forget that Tiger football once counted a total of five wins in three seasons (2009-11). Now we’re supposed to be disappointed with a nine-win (possibly 10-win) season??

The Tigers were in contention for the American Athletic Conference championship until their loss to SMU in the season’s 11th game. This should be the standard for the program, as long as they sit outside the four remaining “power” conferences (SEC, ACC, Big 10, Big 12). It’s a formidable challenge for coach Ryan Silverfield and his staff, especially with a $220 million renovation scheduled for Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium. Memphis remains a basketball town and its flagship university a basketball school. But can the football program make the right kind of dent on that perception, both locally and nationally? In my view, nine-win seasons are a significant step in that direction.

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Opinion The Last Word

The JFK Generations

John F. Kennedy (Photo: Richie Lomba | Dreamstime)

Editor’s note: This story was originally published in the Flyer in November 2013.

As a young boy, I did not want to grow up to be president of the United States. On a beach vacation when I was 6 or 7, my parents gave me a children’s biography of John F. Kennedy. Along with a similar volume about Abraham Lincoln. Each story had its inspiring moments, of course, but neither ended well. Especially in the mind of a child.

I’ve since become an amateur presidential historian, and, now enjoying middle age, I still don’t want to grow up to be president of the United States. That said, few people outside my family have had an impact on me the way our 35th president has. Considering I was born six years after JFK’s dreadful, history-changing ride through Downtown Dallas, that impact speaks volumes on the importance Jack Kennedy continues to hold in the way Americans shape their values and the way we steer our lives. The calendar never hits November 22nd without making me pause.

Frankly, President Kennedy belongs as much to mythology as he does to history. And this is a component of his legacy that must be accepted every bit as much as his policy decisions, the Peace Corps, or “Ich bin ein Berliner.” He had — still has — a charisma that, before him, could hardly be categorized as presidential. Just picture the men who directly preceded and followed JFK in the White House. Dwight Eisenhower was an American legend before he even considered a presidential campaign. Lyndon Johnson made the Senate his personal playground (and made a more direct impact on the way Americans live than did Kennedy). But neither looked especially dashing in a tux. Neither made women swoon. And neither married Jackie.

Kennedy was polarizing before and during his presidency, and he remains so today. Millions remain inspired by the hope (and yes, glamour) JFK personified, while just as many are repulsed by his womanizing, his manipulative father, and the proverbial silver spoon he had in his pocket on inauguration day in 1961. He may have been a war hero for his efforts in saving members of his PT-109 crew, but Kennedy had blood on his hands for the Bay of Pigs atrocity. Which Kennedy do we choose to remember?

It’s only since I began learning of JFK’s flaws that I’ve felt his influence closer to my own life, more in human terms. Who among us would have handled the life presented to Jack Kennedy better than he did himself? An older brother idolized, only to be taken in a fiery plane crash, a loss that thrust a young man onto a stage he may or may not have welcomed without that legendary fatherly shove. Factoring in his own experience in battle, his debilitating back pain (which forced him to wear a brace that factored into the tragedy of November 22, 1963), and a struggle with Addison’s disease, Kennedy had a sense of mortality most of us keep safely in another compartment of our minds. In succumbing to the lure of women outside his marriage, Kennedy displayed an immaturity in the only form he was ever allowed. No excuse, but a sad truth.

Was Kennedy a great president? Having not completed a term, he belongs in a different category of evaluation. For me, his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962 was the stuff of greatness. Diplomacy begins in a room with your friends, your supporters. Kennedy helped avoid World War III by negotiating a policy, first with a divided cabinet and only then with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. Did Kennedy save the world? That might be a stretch, but it’s in the conversation.

I’ve been to Dealey Plaza twice. For anyone who’s seen footage of JFK’s last moments, such a visit swallows your thoughts, freezes your tongue, and squeezes your heart. What was once the Texas School Book Depository — now the Dallas County Administration Building, with a museum on the sixth floor — is just brick and mortar. With windows. Such was the platform for a murder that changed the world? I’ve never been able to process this reality, not since first reading that children’s book almost 40 years ago.

I’ve also been to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston. Just as Dealey Plaza haunts, the library inspires, a reminder of how very alive its namesake remains. I never knew John F. Kennedy, but I feel like he knew men like me. Indeed, I breathe the same air. I cherish my children’s future. And I, too, am mortal.

Frank Murtaugh is the managing editor of Memphis Magazine. He writes the columns “From My Seat” and “Tiger Blue” for the Flyer.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Three Thoughts: When Fortune Favors

Photo by Wes Hale

Five weeks into the Memphis Tigers’ current season, I mentioned a certain good-fortune factor that seemed to be playing a role for a program historically cursed by, we’ll call it today, less-than-good fortune. (Anyone remember the name Gino Guidugli?) When breaks happen on Tiger game days, historically, they don’t tend to go the blue-and-gray way. Folks … that was then. Since that column (October 2nd), Memphis has won a game in which it allowed a go-ahead touchdown with 47 seconds remaining in the contest. Memphis has won a game in which it allowed its opponent 50 points on home turf. And now, Memphis has won a game in which it trailed by 10 points on the road with less than eight minutes to play. That sparkling 8-2 record could easily be 5-5, or worse.

Following his team’s three-point win over Boise State on September 30th, Tiger coach Ryan Silverfield painted a picture of his team’s collective culture. Having fallen behind the Broncos, 17-0, the Memphis program seemed to turn a corner that may have changed this season permanently. “The 118 guys on the sideline were like, ‘What do we have to do? How do we keep fighting?’ That’s what makes this group special. There was no fret. There was no ‘Oh my gosh.’ Just, ‘What do we need to do to get back in this game?’” A win or two can be attributed to luck, and that goes for every team in every season. But a team doesn’t win eight of 10 games without having two things: collective talent and collective will. It’s been especially gratifying to see an “unlucky” football program pile up wins that seem to tilt in its favor in ways opponents once enjoyed.

• With SMU coming to Memphis this Saturday for a clash between 8-2 teams, you can’t help but think back to November 2, 2019, when an 8-0 Mustangs team visited a 7-1 Memphis team to cap the biggest Saturday — at that time — in the program’s history. With ESPN’s College GameDay crew on Beale Street and more than 58,000 fans packing the Liberty Bowl (no SEC team in sight!), the Tigers won a classic, 54-48, on its way to an AAC championship and a berth in the Cotton Bowl. 

Both SMU (6-0 in the American Athletic Conference) and Memphis (5-1) are in contention to play in the AAC championship game … but the Tigers cannot afford another loss for such a dream (last realized in that unforgettable 2019 season). Will 50,000 fans pack what we now call Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium for this Saturday’s 11 a.m. kickoff? Almost certainly not. Might we see 40,000 in the stadium for the first time this fall? If not, more consideration needs to be given to the fact that the Tigers’ den is simply too large for the program. Because this Memphis team has earned a football party.


• The Tigers will take the field Saturday with a home record of 4-1 this season and a total of 55 home wins since 2014. Only three programs in the country have won more in front of their own fans over the last decade of college football, and you’ve heard of them: Alabama, Clemson, and Ohio State. No, Memphis isn’t beating SEC, ACC, or Big 10 foes. But the Tigers have made Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium a rough place to play for visitors. How many seasons before 2014 were needed for Memphis to win 55 home games? The answer is twenty (1994-2013), precisely twice as long as the current decade of joy. The “golden era” of Memphis Tiger football? You’re living it. Still.