November 6, 1939
Patrick Fain Dye, who coached Auburn University’s football team from 1981 until 1992, was born on Nov. 6, 1939 in rural Blythe, Georgia. Dye played football at the University of Georgia and earned All-SEC and All-American honors. After completing his military service to fulfil an ROTC obligation, Dye went to work for coach Paul “Bear” Bryant at the University of Alabama as a defensive coach. Alabama won two national championships and five SEC championships during Dye’s tenure, leading him to his first job as a head coach at East Carolina University. After a 48-18-1 record, he spent one year at the University of Wyoming and took a team that had a losing record the previous season to a 6-5 record. Next stop, Auburn, where his teams went 99-39-4 and became consistently competitive with the Crimson Tide. Dye led the effort to play the Iron Bowl in Auburn every other year after the contract to play the game annually at Legion Field ended in 1988.
Read more at Encyclopedia of Alabama.
Pat Dye (1939- ) is a hall-of-fame college football coach who led Auburn University’s program from 1981-92, amassing a record of 99 wins, 39 losses, and 4 ties with the Tigers. His legacy includes moving Auburn’s home field during the Iron Bowl from Birmingham to Auburn in the early 1980s. Dye’s Auburn teams won four Southeastern Conference championships. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, courtesy of The Birmingham News)
University of Alabama football coaches Pat Dye, left, and Paul “Bear” Bryant converse over dinner at a hunting lodge in Greene County in 1972. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, courtesy of The Doy Leale McCall Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of South Alabama)
Former Auburn University football coaches Pat Dye, right, and Tommy Tuberville during a practice in December 2002. Dye retains close ties to the university and lives nearby in Notasulga, Macon County. Tuberville resigned as head coach in 2008 and in 2010 took the head coaching position at Texas Tech University. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, courtesy of The Birmingham News)
Pat Dye was named National Coach of the Year in 1983 and SEC Coach of the Year three times during his tenure at the helm of the Auburn Tigers football program. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, Property of The Birmingham News)
Former Auburn University football coach Pat Dye at his home in Crooked Oaks near Notasulga, Macon County, in October 2002. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, courtesy of The Birmingham News)
A ceremony honoring former Auburn Tigers head coach Pat Dye for his induction to the College Football Hall of Fame during the game against the Alabama Crimson Tide at Jordan-Hare Stadium on Nov. 19, 2005 in Auburn, Alabama. The field at Jordan-Hare Stadium was also christened Pat Dye Field. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)
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