For Jackson State coach T.C. Taylor, the Celebration Bowl is becoming old hat.
When the Tigers arrive in Atlanta this week to prepare for Saturday’s game against MEAC champion South Carolina State after clinching the SWAC title for the third time in the last four seasons, it will mark Taylor’s fourth overall appearance in the annual December event.
Taylor, who was a star wide receiver at Jackson State during his collegiate playing days, was an assistant under then-North Carolina Central head coach Jerry Mack when the Eagles played Grambling State in the 2016 Celebration Bowl.
Four years later, Taylor was along for the ride as an offensive assistant when the Deion Sanders-led Jackson State group made consecutive trips to the Celebration Bowl in 2021 and 2022.
Despite Taylor raving about the bowl experience, there is one thing he yearns for more than anything this go around as head coach.
To finally exit Mercedes-Benz Stadium with a win.
“I just feel like if I keep going, eventually I’m going to get one (a win),” Taylor said during Sunday’s virtual Celebration Bowl press conference.
Taylor has been on the losing end of three Celebration Bowls. He watched North Carolina Central lose a 10-9 heartbreaker to Grambling and Jackson State drop consecutive appearances — both as favorites — to South Carolina State and, ironically, N.C. Central in an overtime thriller.
Following the Tigers’ 41-13 win over Southern, which earned them a berth to the de facto HBCU national championship game, Taylor reminded his team to “get it done.”
“I told the players to let’s just prepare and go get it. You got to take care of business like we did on Saturday to get this opportunity,” he said.
A win for Jackson State would give the program its first outright Black National Championship since 1996. And if Taylor and the Tigers were to get over the hump, he would be the first Jackson State coach since James Carson to lead the team to a national title as an alum of the school.
“But just to have the opportunity itself to back to Atlanta, you know, it’s a great event,” said Taylor. “But, you know, as long as I keep getting there, eventually, we’ll get it done. So, it would mean the world, you know, to finally go over there and get it.”
