Know Your Opponent: Eastern Kentucky

EKU has been one of the most successful FCS (formerly
1-AA) teams of the last six decades. Wikimedia Commons

Will Muschamp coaches his last home game as head coach of the Gators against the Colonels of Eastern Kentucky University. Eastern Kentucky State Normal School was established in 1906, on the site of the defunct Central University (founded 1874) in Richmond. In 1930, the institution became Eastern Kentucky State Teachers College and, in 1948, simply Eastern Kentucky State College. The school finally became Eastern Kentucky University in 1966. EKU enrolls nearly 16,000 students (including almost 14,000 undergraduates). The Colonels sport maroon and white.

The EKU football program began in 1909, when the school was still Eastern Kentucky State Normal School. They have been a member of the Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) since it was founded in 1948. The Colonels (known in their earlier years as "the Maroons") have enjoyed consistent success in the lower tier of Division I. Eastern Kentucky has won 21 OVC championships – the first in 1954 and the latest in 2011. The Colonels have also captured two Division I (1-AA/FCS) national championships (1979 and 1982). EKU plays their home games in Roy Kidd Stadium, one of the largest and most imposing stadiums in the lower subdivision of Division I. Roy Kidd Stadium seats over 22,000; the record attendance was achieved in 1979, when over 25,000 came to see the Colonels defeat their arch-rivals, the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers.

The Gators have never faced the Colonels on the gridiron.