by Fred Seely
Editorial Director
Two Jacksonville City Council members had a chance to relive past football glory Wednesday at Alltel Stadium.
“I played right here,” said Daniel Davis. “Right on the field.”
His compatriot on the Council, Art Shad, wasn’t so lucky. “I was on a .500 team. I didn’t make it.”
Neither, of course, played for the Jaguars — their football exploits were all local including playing for the same Pop Warner team, the one representing the west Jacksonville suburb of Lakeshore.
“I guess I played a decade earlier than Daniel,” said Shad, who was present at a press conference to help announce the return to the stadium of the “Little Gator Bowl,” the Pop Warner championship game which has drifted around local high school fields since it was last played at the stadium in 1993. The Gator Bowl Association is paying the stadium rent and all other expenses.
“I think we had an average team,” Shad continued, “but I had a great time. I loved sports, but I couldn’t hit a baseball and I’m height-challenged in basketball, so football was my sport.”
Davis played on a Lakeshore team that made the final game.
“We lost but I remember coming to the stadium, going into the locker room and coming out of the field like it was yesterday,” said Davis. “It’s something I’ll never forget, to play as a kid on a field where the Gators and Bulldogs played.”
Davis went on to play “a little” college football.
“I love a sport where you run as fast as you can into someone else,” he said.
Gator Bowl Association President Rick Catlett also played in the game as a member of the Holiday Hill team that won the championship.
“I remember the old Gator Bowl locker rooms, which were barely more than a concrete block building,” he said. “To us, they were wonderful because we were dressing in the same room that our heroes had been.
“I hope these kids get the same feeling and it’s good for the association to give them the chance,” Catlett went on, recalling his Florida Gator heroes. “I remember coming out and standing where Don Gaffney threw a TD pass and where Richard Trapp ran that way for a score.”
Catlett said the association hopes to expand the Little Gator Bowl to a two-day affair so that all age groups could participate. Only the Midget Division will play in this year’s game, which will be on Oct. 30, the day after the Florida-Georgia game.
The game was moved when the old Gator Bowl was demolished, and the rent at the new stadium was too high for the youth league, which is made up of 21 associations. Since then, the game has been played at Mandarin, First Coast and Forrest highs.