It has been 56 years since NFL alum Archie Manning threw his first touchdown in college, but the years have not dimmed his memory of it.
Manning was in his sophomore year at Ole Miss and making his first start on the road at Memphis State.
“I had never been as nervous in my life,” Manning told NOLA.com last weekend. “The biggest crowd I had played in front of in high school was 300 or 400. There were 50,000 folks in that stadium, and I was a nervous wreck.”
Archie was reminiscing because his grandson Arch, a redshirt freshman at the University of Texas, threw his first college TD pass for the Longhorns last Saturday in a 52-0 win over Colorado State. He had entered the game in the third quarter after Texas jumped out to a 38-0 lead. The younger Manning is the son of Cooper and nephew to NFL alums Peyton and Eli.
Grandpop Archie also remembers son Peyton’s first TD pass in college. It was in 1994 and Peyton and his University of Tennessee teammates were on the road against Mississippi State. He had replaced the starter in the game and threw a 76 yard bomb for the score.
“I remember that one very well,” says Archie, who watched on TV because he was in New Orleans for Eli’s 8th grade game. “Peyton threw a rope on the left side. The defender kinda took a chance and it went for a touchdown. They made a big deal about that throw. It had some RPMs on it.”
Archie was in the stadium at Ole Miss in 2001 when Eli threw his first TD pass for the Rebels in his initial start. Eli finished the game with five TD passes and 18 straight completions which were harbingers of his future NFL career with the Giants.
The Manning family now has thrown 202 college touchdown passes and that total probably will increase since Arch still has three seasons of eligibility left at Texas.
Meanwhile, Archie, who is 75, is enjoying his position as Chairman of the National Football Foundation, a national non-profit which promotes amateur American football on all levels.
We at NFL Alumni wish Archie, wife Olivia and the entire Manning family only the best. We look forward to reading more news out of Austin, Texas about young Arch.
