James Madison Dukes (1972)

A James Madison profile? In a New England blog? Yup.

James Madison University is normally out of the milieux of this site, being based way down in Harrisonburg, Va. (Although from the places I've lived the last 15 years or so, hamlets like Durham, N.H., and Amherst, Mass., are considered "way down.") But JMU, a longtime member of the Yankee Conference/Atlantic 10/CAA, has been on the brain since it announced it was moving on up to the FBS and Sun Belt Conference, effective 2023. It's sad to see the Dukes leave, but since they play in a football-rich region and have a rabid fanbase, my guess is they'll handle FBS better than, well, these guys have. 

The school was known simply as Madison College when it fielded its first football team in 1972. According to Wikipedia (so it must be true),  the school's president wanted to attract more men and change its reputation as an all-women's teachers college. 

James Madison University's first football team in 1972,
when it was still known as Madison College. 
You've got to start somewhere. 

A newspaper article from 1972
heralds the arrival of JMU football.

Judging by the results and pictures, the Dukes appear to have been little more than a ragtag club team in '72; they were shut out in all five games, with the "highlight" a scoreless tie with the mighty Hampden–Sydney jayvees. The uniforms, as you might expect, were pretty basic; they look barely above the level of practice duds. JMU wore yellow helmets (gold didn't arrive until the mid-80s) with an extremely basic "MC" on each side.

A couple shots of the first-year Dukes from the 1973 Bluestone yearbook.
Note that one Duke has a white helmet, a reminder of the first-year team's ragtag nature.
(No, I'm not putting it in the uniform graphic. That's just getting silly.) 

The '72 Dukes under the lights.

After a rough start, MC/JMU took off pretty quickly, going undefeated in 1975 and winning the Virginia Collegiate Athletic Association title. (Two members of the spotless '75 team also were on the winless '73 bunch.) The Dukes joined I-AA/FCS in 1980 and the Yankee Conference in 1993, and won NCAA FCS titles in 2004 and '16.

For perspective, a shot of the undefeated 1975 team in action.
Note the turf field and fans in the larger stands.

So just think: Somewhere out there, some small school no one has ever heard of is borrowing pads and socks and scrambling to put a club football team together. And that obscure team today may be playing for a national title in front of 20,000 fans in 20-30 years.

I also took a brief look at JMU in this profile of the 1996 Yankee Conference teams.