Illinois to honor Red Grange with uniforms vs Michigan for 100-year anniversary of legendary game
Illinois football is playing well on the field, off to a 5-1 start to the 2024 college football season and a top-25 ranking. The athletics department is also doing its part to keep them looking good.
The Fighting Illini unveiled throwback uniforms for Saturday's contest at Memorial Stadium in Champaign, where they will face Big Ten foe Michigan. The throwback uniforms are being worn 100 years and one day after Red Grange’s historic six-touchdown performance against the Wolverines on Oct. 18, 1924.
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On that historic day, Grange finished with 402 total yards and scored six touchdowns in a 39-14 victory over Michigan. The ranked matchup between No. 21 Illinois and No. 22 Michigan comes nearly 100 years to the day of the otherworldly performance for Grange. Interestingly, the Wolverines and Fighting Illini shared the national championship in 1923. Michigan will also serve as the defending champions this time around.
Here's what you need to know about Grange and the Illinois football throwback uniforms for its matchup against Michigan on Saturday:
What do the Illinois throwback jerseys look like?
According to the school's news release, the jerseys feature a blue base with tannish gold stripes, which form a pyramid shape and run from the bottom of the shirt to the top of the numbers. The jerseys also feature white numbers and blue outlines. The only orange features on them will be from the Memorial Stadium 100th Anniversary patch, which the Illini have worn all season.
The custom pants will also feature stripes with a tannish-gold hue. To complete the throwback uniforms, they will be paired with blue socks.
“The jerseys are pretty simplistic,” Jake Rosch, director of football equipment operations, said in a news release from the university. “It was designed 100 years ago, so they were limited in their manufacturing capabilities at that time. We were able to match the jersey design, which is really cool because we wanted to be as historically accurate from 100 years ago as we could possibly make it.”
Who was Red Grange?
Harold "Red" Grange was born on Jun. 13, 1903, in Forksville, Pennsylvania. He attended the University of Illinois from 1923-25. Grange is enshrined in the College Football Football Hall of Fame and the Pro Football Hall of Fame for his outstanding career. He was on the 1923 national champion Illinois team and also won Super Bowl rings with the Bears in 1932 and 1933.
He was nicknamed "Red" due to his red hair and was also called the "Galloping Ghost." Notably, despite playing running back, quarterback, wide receiver and defensive back, Grange wore No. 77 during his career.
Grange was listed at 5-foot-11, 175 pounds by the College Football Hall of Fame. In his first collegiate game against Nebraska, Grange scored three touchdowns, setting the tone for his career. He played only 20 collegiate games but had impressive stats with 388 rushes for 2,071 yards (5.3 yards per rush), 14 catches for 253 yards, and completed 40 of 82 passes for 575 yards. He had 31 career touchdowns, with 16 being from at least 20 yards out and nine from 50 or more yards.
Following Illinois' season finale on Nov. 21, 1925, against Ohio State in Columbus, Ohio, Grange announced he was going pro. As there was no NFL draft at the time, Grange was able to negotiate a deal with Bears owner and coach George Halas. Grange was paid a reported $3,000 per game and a varying percentage of the gate revenue, per ESPN.
In the NFL, Grange had two stints with the Chicago Bears (1925 and 1929-34) and played for the New York Yankees (1926-27). Due to his excitement when he played, Grange is known for "putting pro football on the map." For his first game, the Bears sold out Cubs Field (renamed Wrigley Field later) for 36,000 fans.
Grange played in the NFL for nine seasons and appeared in 96 games. He missed the 1928 season before returning to the Bears, where he continued to play both sides of the ball. He had a touchdown-saving tackle in the fourth quarter of a 23-21 in the 1933 NFL Championship Game at Wrigley Field.
Grange was included in the 2002 NCAA's "Football's Finest" publication, which put together the stats for 3,000 of college football's "finest players and coaches associated with college football." He died at the age of 87 of pneumonia on Jan. 28, 1991, in Lakes Wales, Florida.
Red Grange's stats vs Michigan 1924
Michigan entered the matchup against the Fighting Illini not having suffered a loss in 20 straight games (18-0-2) and had outscored its opponents 443-32 in that span. That did not faze Grange. He returned the opening kickoff from the 5-yard line and scored on the 95-yard touchdown kickoff off return.
On the next drive, he returned the ball to the 33 before scoring a 67-yard touchdown on the first play from scrimmage. He added a 44-yard touchdown run after a Michigan fumble on the next possession. He added touchdown runs of 95, 67, 56, and 44 yards in the first half. Grange scored another rushing touchdown in the third quarter and added a passing touchdown before being taken out of the game.
The 402 all-purpose yards ― 212 rushing yards, 64 passing and 126 kickoff returns ― still rank third all-time in a single game in the Big Ten.