Presenters for this year’s The Home Depot College Football Awards – live on Thursday, Dec. 11, at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN – include eight College Football Hall of Fame inductees and five past award show recipients. Now in its 24th year, the show features the live presentation of:
- Nine National College Football Awards Association (NCFAA) player awards
- The NCFAA Contributions to College Football Award
- The Home Depot Coach of the Year Award
- The Disney Spirit Award
- Student-athletes selected to the Walter Camp All-America Team and The Allstate AFCA Good Works Teams®
Presenters include:
*2013 award winner
The NCFAA announced earlier today that they NCFAA Contributions to College Football Award will be presented to Grant Teaff. A member of the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach, Teaff was instrumental in bringing back Baylor football to prominence from 1972-92 and won two Southwest Conference championships as the head coach of the Bears and was named SWC Coach of the Year six times and National Coach of the Year twice. He later served as athletic director at Baylor. With the AFCA for the last two decades, Teaff has been a leading force whether it be in the area of football rules or at the forefront of the concussion issue or the development of coaches in the profession.
Oklahoma Sooners coach Bob Stoops and junior wide receiver Sterling Shepard will be awarded theDisney Spirit Award by Disney Sports Executive Faron Kelley. The award is given annually to college football’s most inspirational figure or team in college football. Following the tragic death of former Sooners receiver and graduate assistant coach Derrick Shepard, Stoops selflessly became a father figure to Derrick Shepard’s six-year-old son Sterling Shepard and welcomed him into the Sooners family. In a remarkable twist of fate, that fatherless young boy grew into a superstar football player who, at the end of his high school career in suburban Oklahoma City, fittingly signed to play for the University of Oklahoma where he is among the top receivers in college football. Shepard will be on-site to accept the award.
The Walter Camp All-America Team and The Allstate AFCA Good Works Teams® will also be recognized on the show. The Allstate AFCA Good Works Teams® recognizes the extra efforts made by college football players and student support staff off the field.
Additionally, the John Mackey Award (Outstanding Tight End), the Rimington Award (Outstanding Center) and the William V. Campbell Trophy (Academic Success) will be recognized during The Red Carpet Special at The Home Depot College Football Awards. Nick O’Leary (Florida State), Clive Walford (Miami) and Maxx Williams (Minnesota) are finalists for the John Mackey Award; Jack Allen (Michigan State), David Andrews (Georgia), Reece Dismukes (Auburn), B.J. Finney (Kansas State), Andy Gallik (Boston College) and Hroniss Grasu (Oregon) were named finalists for the Rimington Award today and the 17 finalist for the Campbell Trophy were announced on Oct. 30.
2014 The Home Depot College Football Awards Highlights
The 24th annual awards show – hosted by ESPN’s Rece Davis, and joined by Lee Corso, Kirk Herbstreit, Desmond Howard, Tom Rinaldi and Samantha Ponder – will originate from the Atlantic Dance Hall at Disney’s BoardWalk at the Walt Disney World Resort in Lake Buena Vista, Fla.
- College Football Live will air from the BoardWalk at 2:30 p.m. on ESPN. Host Chris Cotter will be joined by college football analysts Danny Kanell, David Pollack and Joey Galloway.
- The Red Carpet Special at The Home Depot College Football Awards – hosted by Ponder, Kanell, and Rinaldi – will air at 6 m. on ESPNU.
- In addition to the nine awards listed above, The Home Depot College Football Awards will feature the live presentation of the NCFAA (National College Football Awards Association) Contributions to College Football Award; The Home Depot Coach of the Year Award; The Allstate AFCA Good Works Team; the Disney Spirit Award; the student-athletes selected to the Walter Camp All-America Team; and Play of the Year as voted on live by viewers. It will air on ESPN Thursday, Dec. 11 at 7 p.m.
- New for 2014, Championship Drive: CFB Playoff Preview will follow the awards show at 9 p.m. on ESPN. Host Cotter will be joined by Kanell, Pollack and Galloway.
- Viewers can also follow and engage on Twitter by following @ESPNCFB and tagging their tweets using #CFBAwards for news, opinion and behind-the-scenes extras during and leading up to this year’s award show