September 26, 2025 • 8 mins
Join us on Daily Sports History as we dive into the story of Prairie View A&M's infamous 80-game losing streak in college football. Learn about the challenges the team faced, the perseverance of the players, and how the program eventually bounced back from this historic low point. Discover the lessons learned from one of the longest losing streaks in sports history.
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Email: dailysportshistory@gmail.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
On September twenty sixth, nineteen ninety eighth, Prairie View A
and M does something they had not done in nine years.
After losing eighty straight games, Prairie View A and M
wins wins a game fourteen to twelve, and this would
be the beginning to change their fortune. Today, we're going
(00:22):
to dive into how a team loses eighty games in
a row on Daily Sports History. Welcome to Daily Sports History.
I'm Ethan Reeves, your daily guide into sports history helping
you daily. And today's trivia question to listen out for
(00:43):
is how many national championships did Prairie View have before
the end of the Jim Crow Laws. Prayriview A and
M's football team had been around since nineteen oh five,
and currently they are part of the SCS and part
of the South Athletic Conference better known as the SWACK,
which is made up of historically black colleges, and in
(01:06):
the fifties and sixties they actually were one of the
best HBCU colleges out there, winning eight SWACK Conference titles
and five Black College National championships, led by Billy Knicks,
who was known as the Bear Bryant of college football.
And legendary Grambling coach Eddie Robinson would say he dread
playing against prairie View as they were that good. And
(01:28):
Prairieview would actually be the first historic black college to
play in a postseason bowl game, as they put together
their own bowl game, the prairie View Bowl, that would
play from nineteen twenty nine to nineteen sixty one. Now,
an unfortunate side effect to the Jim Crow laws being
abolished was that the historic black colleges lost a lot
of their talent as they would go to these bigger
(01:50):
football programs, and it made it harder for Prairie View
to really compete at the level they were competing before,
not only because Bill Nicks ever retired a new coach,
but just because the talent pool was less and the
game was starting to change. And the nineteen eighties really
win the downfall, as they had winless seasons in nineteen
seventy four, seventy nine, eighty three in eighty four, including
(02:12):
a twenty eight game losing streak from eighty two to
eighty five. But the real issues started when they hired
head coach Hainey Catchings in nineteen eighty seven. He initially
was the interim coach who finished the final seven games
in nineteen eighty seven as the previous coach was fired.
But in nineteen eighty eight he put together the first
non losing season for the team in thirteen years, going
(02:35):
five to five. But the problem was how he did this,
as he regularly was trying to force his players to
abandon their studies, and Catchings would withhold textbook and financial
aid until players would quote prove themselves on the field
and some would get their books until the middle of
the semester. As a result, forty three of the fifty
(02:55):
five man roster had great point average below the NCAA
minimum of two point zero, which is a C average,
and the players actually demanded that catching be fired, and
as they boycotted the team when their demand was not
met by the administration, Catchings was eventually fired, but not
due to what he had done to the players. Instead
(03:17):
what he had done to the university as he misreported
financial information and there was more than one hundred thousand
dollars missing from the athletic department count as Catchings was
filling out fraudulent expense reports, and he actually pled guilty
to felony and misdemeanor charges due to this, and had
to serve five year probation and pay over fifteen hundred
(03:37):
dollars in fine and restitution. Following the nineteen eighty nine season,
they would disband the team as they didn't have the
money to support a team and give out scholarships as
well as fix up the field in the track to
serviceable standards, but they did decide in nineteen ninety one
to return, but to do so without scholarships. Now, I
previously coached at a Division III school that doesn't have scholarships.
(04:01):
That went from an NAI school that has scholarships to
a Division III school. It is beyond my comprehension to
play schools that have scholarships versus a school that does not.
You're asking players to pay to play, which is very
difficult when you're facing another guy who's getting offered at
least a little bit of money to play, and that
(04:21):
makes them feel like something, and so they're gonna take that.
So recruiting is harder. You have less talent, you have
less budget, and throughout the nineteen nineties they lost as
they could not afford scholarships. They would eventually ask alumni
to help support possible scholarships, but the most they could
get was for a total of nine scholarships, and to
(04:42):
do that facing against schools who have regularly over sixty
players of scholarship, it's a daunting task and they would
lose by huge amounts and they would have six straight
winless seasons. So by the time in nineteen ninety eight,
nobody on the team had won a game. But luckily
(05:02):
the team started to realize maybe we should play some
different teams and they started to play some lower level competition,
but they still had to play their conference games, which
were all scholarship teams. But they did play Howard Payne,
who was a Division III school, for the second game
of the season and they lost fourteen twenty two, and
coming into their fourth game of the season, they were
(05:24):
three to zero and had lost eighty games, but they
were facing Langston College, who was an Innaia school. If
you heard our previous episode about how the NAII started,
you know that they do have scholarships, but it's only
twenty four compared to the sixty three at FCS and
the eighty at BS, which is changing. So Langston University
(05:46):
did have scholarship players, but is much less than who
was in their conference. So they were playing Langston on
September twenty sixth, nineteen ninety eight, at home, and they
were able to get the lead going into the fourth
quarter fourteen to six in front of nine thousand fans,
hoping for the first win in the decade in the
(06:07):
nineteen nineties, But Langston drove the length of the field
and scored a late touchdown in the final minutes, making
the score to twelve, and Langston went for two to
tie the game. Now, though this would technically end the
losing streak, a tie would end that, they did not
want end that way, and they held a defensive stand
(06:27):
and stopped the two point conversion, which led them to
win score to twelve, ending their losing streak. Now, that
was still their only win that season, although they did
come within three points facing another NAI school, Oklahoma Panhandle State.
In the next five years, they would only win eleven games.
But things started to change as Prayer Views started to
(06:50):
gain a little bit more financial backing and were able
to start offering scholarships again, and due to this, it
changed the fortune around when you start to get scholarship players,
because when you start to get a scholarship player, your
team can start facing scholarship players with more equality and
have better chances of winning. And in two thousand and
nine they finally won another conference title, going nine to one,
(07:14):
winning the SWACK title, becoming a great school again. And
in twenty fourteen they actually broke around on a fifty
million dollars stadium in Athletic Fieldhouse, showing that they were
back to being a school that prioritized football and had
the money to support a FCS school and a lot
(07:35):
of times that's what you need to really compete. And
if you want to learn more about the FCS, check
out FC Nation where they go through the biggest games
in the FCS, breaking down what happened about the Football
Championship Series so that you can stay on top of
what is going on in the FCS. We'll put a
link to their description below. This now is a great
(07:55):
time to listen as conference players starting to pick up
and you get some of the best rick in the FCS.
And if you enjoyed today's episode, please let us know
by leaving us a review wherever you're listening, and if
you want, leave us your name and a topic you
want us to cover and we'll do that episode just
for you and come back tomorrow for more Daily Sport's
(08:16):
history and the answer. Today's trivia question is how many
national championships did Prairie View have before the end of
the Jim Crow Laws. Prairie View had five black college
national championships before the Jim Crow Laws were abolished and
national championships were now open to everybody.
On September twenty sixth, nineteen ninety eighth, Prairie View A
and M does something they had not done in nine years.
After losing eighty straight games, Prairie View A and M
wins wins a game fourteen to twelve, and this would
be the beginning to change their fortune. Today, we're going
(00:22):
to dive into how a team loses eighty games in
a row on Daily Sports History. Welcome to Daily Sports History.
I'm Ethan Reeves, your daily guide into sports history helping
you daily. And today's trivia question to listen out for
(00:43):
is how many national championships did Prairie View have before
the end of the Jim Crow Laws. Prayriview A and
M's football team had been around since nineteen oh five,
and currently they are part of the SCS and part
of the South Athletic Conference better known as the SWACK,
which is made up of historically black colleges, and in
(01:06):
the fifties and sixties they actually were one of the
best HBCU colleges out there, winning eight SWACK Conference titles
and five Black College National championships, led by Billy Knicks,
who was known as the Bear Bryant of college football.
And legendary Grambling coach Eddie Robinson would say he dread
playing against prairie View as they were that good. And
(01:28):
Prairieview would actually be the first historic black college to
play in a postseason bowl game, as they put together
their own bowl game, the prairie View Bowl, that would
play from nineteen twenty nine to nineteen sixty one. Now,
an unfortunate side effect to the Jim Crow laws being
abolished was that the historic black colleges lost a lot
of their talent as they would go to these bigger
(01:50):
football programs, and it made it harder for Prairie View
to really compete at the level they were competing before,
not only because Bill Nicks ever retired a new coach,
but just because the talent pool was less and the
game was starting to change. And the nineteen eighties really
win the downfall, as they had winless seasons in nineteen
seventy four, seventy nine, eighty three in eighty four, including
(02:12):
a twenty eight game losing streak from eighty two to
eighty five. But the real issues started when they hired
head coach Hainey Catchings in nineteen eighty seven. He initially
was the interim coach who finished the final seven games
in nineteen eighty seven as the previous coach was fired.
But in nineteen eighty eight he put together the first
non losing season for the team in thirteen years, going
(02:35):
five to five. But the problem was how he did this,
as he regularly was trying to force his players to
abandon their studies, and Catchings would withhold textbook and financial
aid until players would quote prove themselves on the field
and some would get their books until the middle of
the semester. As a result, forty three of the fifty
(02:55):
five man roster had great point average below the NCAA
minimum of two point zero, which is a C average,
and the players actually demanded that catching be fired, and
as they boycotted the team when their demand was not
met by the administration, Catchings was eventually fired, but not
due to what he had done to the players. Instead
(03:17):
what he had done to the university as he misreported
financial information and there was more than one hundred thousand
dollars missing from the athletic department count as Catchings was
filling out fraudulent expense reports, and he actually pled guilty
to felony and misdemeanor charges due to this, and had
to serve five year probation and pay over fifteen hundred
(03:37):
dollars in fine and restitution. Following the nineteen eighty nine season,
they would disband the team as they didn't have the
money to support a team and give out scholarships as
well as fix up the field in the track to
serviceable standards, but they did decide in nineteen ninety one
to return, but to do so without scholarships. Now, I
previously coached at a Division III school that doesn't have scholarships.
(04:01):
That went from an NAI school that has scholarships to
a Division III school. It is beyond my comprehension to
play schools that have scholarships versus a school that does not.
You're asking players to pay to play, which is very
difficult when you're facing another guy who's getting offered at
least a little bit of money to play, and that
(04:21):
makes them feel like something, and so they're gonna take that.
So recruiting is harder. You have less talent, you have
less budget, and throughout the nineteen nineties they lost as
they could not afford scholarships. They would eventually ask alumni
to help support possible scholarships, but the most they could
get was for a total of nine scholarships, and to
(04:42):
do that facing against schools who have regularly over sixty
players of scholarship, it's a daunting task and they would
lose by huge amounts and they would have six straight
winless seasons. So by the time in nineteen ninety eight,
nobody on the team had won a game. But luckily
(05:02):
the team started to realize maybe we should play some
different teams and they started to play some lower level competition,
but they still had to play their conference games, which
were all scholarship teams. But they did play Howard Payne,
who was a Division III school, for the second game
of the season and they lost fourteen twenty two, and
coming into their fourth game of the season, they were
(05:24):
three to zero and had lost eighty games, but they
were facing Langston College, who was an Innaia school. If
you heard our previous episode about how the NAII started,
you know that they do have scholarships, but it's only
twenty four compared to the sixty three at FCS and
the eighty at BS, which is changing. So Langston University
(05:46):
did have scholarship players, but is much less than who
was in their conference. So they were playing Langston on
September twenty sixth, nineteen ninety eight, at home, and they
were able to get the lead going into the fourth
quarter fourteen to six in front of nine thousand fans,
hoping for the first win in the decade in the
(06:07):
nineteen nineties, But Langston drove the length of the field
and scored a late touchdown in the final minutes, making
the score to twelve, and Langston went for two to
tie the game. Now, though this would technically end the
losing streak, a tie would end that, they did not
want end that way, and they held a defensive stand
(06:27):
and stopped the two point conversion, which led them to
win score to twelve, ending their losing streak. Now, that
was still their only win that season, although they did
come within three points facing another NAI school, Oklahoma Panhandle State.
In the next five years, they would only win eleven games.
But things started to change as Prayer Views started to
(06:50):
gain a little bit more financial backing and were able
to start offering scholarships again, and due to this, it
changed the fortune around when you start to get scholarship players,
because when you start to get a scholarship player, your
team can start facing scholarship players with more equality and
have better chances of winning. And in two thousand and
nine they finally won another conference title, going nine to one,
(07:14):
winning the SWACK title, becoming a great school again. And
in twenty fourteen they actually broke around on a fifty
million dollars stadium in Athletic Fieldhouse, showing that they were
back to being a school that prioritized football and had
the money to support a FCS school and a lot
(07:35):
of times that's what you need to really compete. And
if you want to learn more about the FCS, check
out FC Nation where they go through the biggest games
in the FCS, breaking down what happened about the Football
Championship Series so that you can stay on top of
what is going on in the FCS. We'll put a
link to their description below. This now is a great
(07:55):
time to listen as conference players starting to pick up
and you get some of the best rick in the FCS.
And if you enjoyed today's episode, please let us know
by leaving us a review wherever you're listening, and if
you want, leave us your name and a topic you
want us to cover and we'll do that episode just
for you and come back tomorrow for more Daily Sport's
(08:16):
history and the answer. Today's trivia question is how many
national championships did Prairie View have before the end of
the Jim Crow Laws. Prairie View had five black college
national championships before the Jim Crow Laws were abolished and
national championships were now open to everybody.
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