UMass Football History--1989

I've added 16 scans from three game day programs and from the 1989 press guide to the UMass Football History Picassa Web album in the side bar of the blog.

Included in the scans is a copy of the 1989 Spring Game handout.

Use the little magnifying glass symbol to enlarge the images, which make reading the text easier.

Click on images for a larger view

UMass would finish 1989 5-5-1 and 3-5 in the Yankee Conference. UMass won the Yankee Conference Bean Pot in 1988 and would win it again in 1990. I believe UMass' 28-28 tie against JMU in 1989 was the last tie in the program's history.

All-Yankee Conference in 1989 were:

• George Karelas LB --150 TT in '89
• Matt Tulley LB
• Chip Mitchell WR -- set a then UMass career record of 1,590 receiving yards
• Kai Dietiker OL
• Anthony Guidice OL
• Joe Cullen-- there is an article about him in the scans.

1989 was the debut of Gary Wilkos.  Despite not starting until the fifth game of the season, Wilkos had 1,171 yards passing and was the second leading rusher on the team with 632 yards. Wilkos was a potential All-American at QB. Wilkos was ECAC Rookie-of-the-Week at Delaware. He also won the New England Gold Helmet award, and the Bill Knight Award for the Minutemen's win over New Hampshire.

 # 18 is Wilkos. #49 is fullback Duncan MacRae. #69 was OG Phil Hallard.

Although not visually exciting, included is a scan of the cover of the UMass-Lehigh game program. The 1989 game was the only time Mrs. Blog and I would visit Goodman Stadium.

I vividly remember Jerome Bledsoe having a great game against the Engineers. UMass rang up 50 rushes for 326 yards. Bledsoe had 209 yards on 19 carries for a 11.0 yards per carry average. He was named ECAC Offense Player-of-the Week. Bledsoe didn't have a lot of long runs. He just flat ran over Lehigh's defense. The Engineer defenders bounced off the 5-10 180 pd Bledsoe all day.

The Lehigh game was another episode in Jimmie Reid's coaching legend. Reid was known to chew out opposing players if he thought they were not playing the game the way he thought they should.

After the Friday practice some of the Engineer players doffed their pads and settled down in the bleachers to watch the UMass practice. Coach Reid went charging into the stands to tell the Lehigh players to get their asses back into the clubhouse and start getting ready to play the next day.

Anyone have any 1989 memories to add in comments?