Former Eastern Kentucky Head Coach Roy Kidd to Receive 2023 AFCA Amos Alonzo Stagg Award

Former Eastern Kentucky University head coach and 1998 AFCA President Roy Kidd will receive the AFCA’s 2023 Amos Alonzo Stagg Award. The award is given to those “whose services have been outstanding in the advancement of the best interests in football,” and will be presented during the 2023 AFCA Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Kidd spent a total of 45 years with the Eastern Kentucky football program. He lettered for four years in both football and baseball at EKU and was named All-Ohio Valley Conference and a “Little All-American” in 1953 as a quarterback. On the baseball field, Kidd was a star centerfielder who batted .300 or better for four consecutive seasons. After graduation, Kidd became a student assistant coach in 1954. That football team went undefeated and won the Ohio Valley Conference.

In 1955, Kidd moved on to the high school level as an assistant coach at Madison Central High School, followed by six years as head coach at Richmond Madison High School where his teams went a combined 54-10-1. In 1963, Kidd returned to EKU as an assistant coach, then in 1964, he was named the Colonels’ head coach.

Over his 39 seasons as head coach, Kidd claimed 314 victories and 37 winning seasons. The Colonels won 16 Ohio Valley Conference titles, appeared in 17 NCAA Division I-AA playoffs, and won two national championships in 1979 and 1982. From 1979 to 1982, EKU went 46-7 and appeared in four straight Division I-AA championship games.

Kidd set the national record for most NCAA Division I-AA playoff appearances and upon his retirement in 2002, was the sixth winningest coach in NCAA history. Kidd also coached 55 All-Americans, 202 First Team All-OVC players, and had 41 players sign National Football League contracts.

Kidd won six AFCA District/Regional Coach of the Year awards, two Division I-AA National Coach of the Year honors and was a 10-time OVC Coach of the Year. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2003 and is also a member of the Eastern Kentucky University Hall of Fame, the Ohio Valley Conference Hall of Fame, and the Kentucky Athletics Hall of Fame.

In honor of Coach Kidd’s influence and success at Eastern Kentucky, the Colonels’ football stadium was named in his honor and the street that front’s the stadium has been renamed “Roy and Sue Kidd Way.”

The Award

The Amos Alonzo Stagg Award is given to the “individual, group or institution whose services have been outstanding in the advancement of the best interests of football.” Its purpose is “to perpetuate the example and influence of Amos Alonzo Stagg.”

The award is named in honor of a man who was instrumental in founding the AFCA in the 1920s. He is considered one of the great innovators and motivating forces in the early development of the game of football. The plaque given to each recipient is a replica of the one given to Stagg at the 1939 AFCA Convention in tribute to his 50 years of service to football.

Amos Alonzo Stagg

Amos Alonzo Stagg began his coaching career at the School of Christian Workers, now Springfield (Mass.) College, after graduating from Yale University in 1888.

Stagg also served as head coach at Chicago (1892-1932) and College of the Pacific (1933-1946). His 41 seasons at Chicago is one of the longest head coaching tenures in the history of the college game.

Among the innovations credited to Stagg are the tackling dummy, the huddle, the reverse play, man in motion, knit pants, numbering plays and players, and the awarding of letters.

A long-time AFCA member, Stagg was the Association’s 1943 Coach of the Year.

According to NCAA records, Stagg’s 57-year record as a college head coach is 314-199-35. He was 84 years old when he ended his coaching career at Pacific in 1946. He died in 1965 at the age of 103.

Past Amos Alonzo Stagg Award Winners: