A giant figure in Tennessee sports has died.
Johnny Majors was a football star at the University of Tennessee who went on to become one of the winningest coaches in school history.
Majors passed away at his home in Knoxville. He was 85 years old. His death was confirmed by his family.
Majors grew up in Lynchburg and became a do-everything star at UT. He was runner up for the Heisman Trophy in 1956. But as he recalled during a speech at East Tennessee State in 2011, his on-field accomplishments came during a time of segregation.
“In the Southeastern Conference I never played against a black player,” he said. “We never had a black player at Mississippi State, Tennessee, Arkansas — and that was wrong. Plain and simple. That was wrong for history. But that’s another story. But a very important story.”
Majors first coached a black player at Iowa State in the late 1960s, when he led that school to its first-ever bowl appearance. He went on to coach at the Pitt, turning around a dismal program and winning a national championship in 1976 with future NFL Hall of Famer Tony Dorsett.
The following year he returned to his alma mater where he coached until an acrimonious split with the University of Tennessee in 1992. The relationship was repaired in later years and the school retired his jersey in 2012.
Majors’ survivors include his wife, Mary Lynn Majors, and two children.
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