Tigers Head To The Metroplex To Face Southern In State Fair Showdown Saturday Afternoon

• Texas Southern football hits the road again for the first of three straight games away from home as they’ll face  Southern University in the 2nd annual State Fair Showdown in Dallas at the Cotton Bowl on Saturday at 2 p.m.

• Picked to win the SWAC West, Southern University has a two-game lead and is in the driver’s seat towards its second straight SWAC West title. The Jaguars are coming off a 34-28 win over Prairie View A&M last weekend.

• Saturday’s contest will feature live audio on KTSU 90.9 FM.

• The Tigers feature a new head coach in Clarence McKinney. A Houston native, McKinney attended high school across the street at Jack Yates High School and played collegiately at Montana State and the University of Mary. He also served as head coach at Yates before joining the staffs at Houston, Texas A&M and Arizona.

• Clarence McKinney is the 17th head coach in the history of Texas Southern Football. McKinney has a task ahead as the program has only had 28 winning seasons in 73 years of existence and hasn’t recorded a winning season since 2000. 

• McKinney won as a student at Yates High School and helped the University of Mary post three winning seasons as a student-athlete in college which made school history. As head coach at Yates, McKinney posted a mark of 30-8 over three years before moving on to the collegiate ranks as an assistant. As an assistant at Houston, Texas A&M and Arizona, McKinney has only experienced two losing seasons in his 11 years of collegiate coaching. 

• Four of the final five games are on the road for the Tigers including the next three games.

• Southern has won seven straight games over TSU dating back to 2012.

• TSU has scored 152 points in its first five games this season. It took nine games last season for the Tigers to score 150-plus points.

• TSU is ranked No.4 in the SWAC with 429.5 yards of total offense per game. The Tigers are the No. 4 passing team and No. 8 in rushing.

• Freshman Richard Garcia III is 11-of-13 on field goal attempts with a long of 45 yards. He ranks fourth in the NCAA in field goals per game and 17th in field goal percentage.