PODCAST
Thursday night, UWF plays its first Division I football game. On the new episode of We Don’t Color on the Dog, I sit down with longtime UWF broadcaster Will Kennedy to talk about what it means for the Panhandle to finally have a D-I program — and why the Argonauts aren’t easing into it. Southern Illinois arrives ranked 16th nationally, led by Walter Payton Award finalist DJ Williams.
“It’s kind of hard for an old guy like me who goes back with this university thirty-plus years to wrap my head around that, but it’s gonna be awesome.”
- Kickoff: Thursday, ESPN+ at 6 p.m., pregame on Sports Radio Pensacola at 5:30 p.m.
- Quarterback battle: Tyrae Davis, Blake Boda and Donovan Leary are competing for the starting job, with the story of former Boston Red Sox farmhand Bubba Thompson — sidelined by injury — looming over it all.
- New voice: Former NFL defensive lineman and Super Bowl champion Fred Robbins joins the broadcast as color analyst.
- The scene: A white-out crowd will watch the Argos play in front of a stadium literally still under construction.
The bigger picture: Kennedy calls it the next milestone in a young program that’s already had plenty of them — from a 2019 national championship to Thursday’s leap into Division I football in the United Athletic Conference. And it comes with local flavor: Austin Reed, the quarterback who won that 2019 title, actually started his career at Southern Illinois before transferring to Pensacola.
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