After 10 Years as a football analyst for national television and radio networks, Terry Bowden returned to the sidelines as a college football coach last fall as head coach at the University of North Alabama where he led the Lions to an 11-2 record and a Gulf South Conference Championship.

UNA also advanced to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Division II playoffs and Bowden was named GSC Co-Coach of the Year.

That type of success, including the Lions' 10-game winning streak to open the season, was nothing new to Bowden who now has a remarkable 122-55-2 record and a 69 percent winning percentage in 16 seasons as a college head coach.

A member of College Football’s most famous coaching family, Terry Bowden accepted the position as head football coach at UNA on New Year’s Eve.

As head coach of the Auburn Tigers from 1993-98, he won 73 percent of his games and posted the best opening five-year run of any head football coach in school history. Also during his time at Auburn, Bowden became the first college coach in 50 years to win his 100th career game by his 40th birthday.

In his first season at Auburn he became the first coach in Division I-A history to have an undefeated and untied season in his first year as a Division IA head coach.

Prior to becoming head football coach at Auburn, Bowden built two programs from the ground up as head coach at Salem College (W.V.) and Samford University (Ala.). When he took the job at Salem in 1983 he became the nation’s youngest head coach in college football at age 26.

During his time away from coaching, Bowden first served as a studio analyst and color commentator with ABC Sports’ college football coverage. He then served as an expert analyst for Westwood One Radio’s College Football National Game of Week, co-hosted “The Coaches Show” on Sirius Satellite Radio with Jack Arute, and was the exclusive college football columnist for Yahoo! Sports. He also works several times a month as a motivational speaker.

As a student-athlete at West Virginia University, Bowden lettered two years as a running back (1977-78), held a 3.65 GPA in accounting, the highest GPA on the football team, and graduated Magna Cum Laude.

He did post graduate work at Oxford University in England, and earned a Juris Doctorate degree from the Florida State University School of Law in 1982 while a graduate assistant coach at FSU.

He was born into THE most famous and successful college football coaching family. His father, Bobby Bowden, turned Florida State into a national champion and his 389 collegiate wins rank second in Division 1A history.

His brother Tommy had an 18-4 record in two seasons as head coach at Tulane and a 72-45 record in 10 seasons as head coach at Clemson University, taking the Tigers to eight bowl games. His brother Jeff also has 25 years of collegiate coaching experience, working at Salem, Samford, Southern Mississippi, Florida State and now UNA.

During the decade of the 1990’s, Terry, Tommy and Bobby all led their teams to undefeated seasons - a feat that will likely never be repeated.

Please change to: Terry Bowden has five daughters (Tera, Jordan, Erin, Cori and Jamie) and one son (Terry, Jr.).  He also has one grandson, Skyler.

Bowden is the eighth head coach in UNA’s modern football history. He inherited a UNA program that had enjoyed four straight seasons with 10-plus wins, and has made four straight NCAA Division II playoff appearances. He added a fifth straight 10-win season and a fifth straight playoff appearance in 2009.

In his first head coaching position at Salem, Bowden inherited a football program that had gone 0-9-1 the year before he arrived. He quickly turned Salem into a winner as the school won the West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WVIAC) Championship, just its second in 80 years, in Bowden’s second season. It was the first of two straight championships for Bowden and Salem. He won 19 of his last 25 games, led the nation in offense both years and the team played in the NAIA national playoffs both years.

Bowden was an assistant coach at Akron for former Notre Dame head coach Gerry Faust in 1986 before taking the helm at Samford in 1987.

Inheriting a Samford program which had won just six games in three years prior to his arrival, Bowden led the Bulldogs to a 9-1 record his first year, tying the record for the best season in school history. The Bulldogs led the nation in total offense (523 yards per game) and scoring offense (51.7 points per game), both national Division III records. The team’s 40 touchdown passes were also a national single-season record.

Bowden then engineered and directed Samford’s move from non-scholarship Division III football to Division I-AA scholarship football. With only one freshman class on scholarship, the Bulldogs went to a full Division I-AA schedule in 1989. By 1991, Samford was competing for the national championship. His 1991 Samford team had the best record in school history at 12-2, and reached the Division I-AA national semifinals.

Bowden was named head coach at Auburn on Dec. 17, 1992, Auburn had a perfect 11-0 record and Bowden swept virtually every national coach of the year award in his rookie season, including Walter Camp, Scripps Howard, Football News, Toyota and the Paul “Bear” Bryant Award presented by the Football Writers Association.
Bowden was again a finalist for coach of the year following his second season at Auburn as the Tigers had reeled off 20 straight wins, an Auburn record, and finished 9-1-1. He posted a 47-17-1 record at Auburn and led the Tigers to three Bowl games.

While at Salem and Samford, Bowden coached quarterback Jimbo Fisher to a NCAA Division III National Player of the Year award. Fisher later became quarterbacks coach for Bowden at Auburn, and after much success as the offensive coordinator for LSU, is now the offensive coordinator at FSU for Bobby Bowden. Another quarterback from Bowden’s time at Auburn, Patrick Nix is the former offensive coordinator at Miami (Fla.).

TERRY BOWDEN COACHING RECORD
Salem College (West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference) (1983–1985)
1983 Salem 3-7
1984 Salem 8-3 WVIAC Champions
1985 Salem 8-3 WVIAC Champions
Salem: 19-13-0

Samford Bulldogs (Ohio Valley Conference) (1987–1992)
1987 Samford 9-1
1988 Samford 5-6
1989 Samford 4-7
1990 Samford 6-4-1
1991 Samford 12-2 Division I-AA Playoffs - Semifinals
1992 Samford 9-3 Division I-AA Playoffs - First Round
Samford: 45-23-1

Auburn Tigers (Southeastern Conference) (1993–1998)
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl Coaches# AP°
1993 Auburn 11-0 8-0 1 - West* Ineligible * 4
1994 Auburn 9-1-1 6-1-1 2 - West* Ineligible * 9
1995 Auburn 8-4 5-3 2 - West L 14-43 Outback Bowl 21 22
1996 Auburn 8-4 4-4 3 - West W 32-29 Independence 25 24
1997 Auburn 10-3 6-2 1 - West (t) W 21-17 Peach Bowl 11 11
1998 Auburn 1-5^ 1-4^ 6 - West
Auburn: 47-17-1 30-14-1

North Alabama Lions (Gulf South Conference) 2009-
Year Team Overall Conference Standings Post-Season
2009 North Alabama 11-2 7-1 GSC Standings Division II Playoffs - Quarterfinals

TERRY BOWDEN NOTES
OVERALL COACHING RECORD:

122-55-2 in 16 seasons as a collegiate head coach. (68 percent winning pct.)


ALL-TIME UNA HEAD FOOTBALL COACHES (1949-2009)
Coach Years Record Winning Pct. NCAA Playoff Appearances
Hal Self 1949-69 109-81-8 57.1
Durell Mock 1970-72 8-24-0 25.0
Mickey Andrews 1973-76 18-21-1 46.2
Wayne Grubb 1977-87 84-33-6 70.7 3
Bobby Wallace 1988-97 82-36-1 69.3 6
Bill Hyde 1998-2001 20-21 48.7
Mark Hudspeth 2002-08 66-21 75.8 5
Terry Bowden 2009- 11-2 84.6 1