Ball State, Georgia State square off in Montgomery’s Camellia Bowl
Ball State wide receiver Justin Hall makes a catch. Saturday's Camellia Bowl pits Ball State against Georgia State. Both teams won bowl games last year. (Ball State Athletics)
Ball State football coach Mike Neu fielded a question during the TaxAct Camellia Bowl press conference that nearly made him cry.
Eleven-year-old Chase Neu, the coach’s youngest son, asked his dad about his motivation to leave his job as quarterback coach with the New Orleans Saints to take the job with the Cardinals.
“Who wouldn’t want to be the quarterback coach in New Orleans working with a guy like Drew Brees?” Neu said. “But when I got the opportunity to come back to Ball State, just like I tell recruits, you can’t ignore that feeling in your gut.
“I had a lot of passion to try to help my alma mater get back to winning ways and I knew it was an unbelievable challenge,” he continued. “Obviously, there’s two ways in which you take over a program: Somebody was extremely successful and moved on to a bigger job, a better job, or the program wasn’t doing quite as well as it should; there was a change made. To come back to Ball State to try to help my alma mater do something special was a great feeling.”
So far, so good for Neu and the Cardinals, who are in their second bowl game in as many seasons. That’s also true of Georgia State, their opponent in the Christmas Day bowl game at 1:30 p.m. on ESPN.
The Cardinals are seeking a second straight bowl victory. Last year, Ball State ended its season 7-1 with a win in the MAC Championship Game and then downed San Jose State 34-13 in the Offerpad Arizona Bowl.
The 2020 Georgia State team wound up 6-4 after winning the Sun Belt Conference title game and then topping Western Kentucky 39-21 in the LendingTree Bowl in Mobile.
Prior to Neu’s arrival last season, Ball State hadn’t had a winning record since 2013. In that span, the Cardinals won 23 games and lost 112.
On the other side of the Cramton Bowl field Saturday, Georgia State coach Shawn Elliott has two children and each is older than the Panthers football program, which Elliott considers his youngest child.
“We’re 12 years old. My kids are older than our football program; they’re 13 and 15,” Elliott said. “Everything we do and experience is new. I’m thrilled to death to be where we are.
“My kids are sitting right over there and I get to experience all the new things with them. I really do,” he said. “And here we are, Georgia State, trying to do something new for the very first time.”
Those first-time events – like going for a second straight bowl win – are “electric” and make Elliott proud.
“You glow from doing that,” he said. “I have been a part of a lot of firsts. I hope I’m here for a lot more firsts and we do have a lot more firsts to get going with our football program.”
Ball State opened the 2021 season at 1-3 and was 5-6 before beating Buffalo 20-3 to become eligible to play in a bowl game.
“We’ve had a season of highs and lows,” Neu said. “We’ve had some moments where we played some really good football, and we’ve had some moments where we’ve had some really tough challenges. But I’m very proud of our football team for finishing the season, to be able to win our final game at home against Buffalo at Scheumann Stadium on Senior Night.”
Georgia State brings a 7-5 record to the Yuletide tussle. The Panthers were 1-4 through their first five games before closing their campaign on a 6-1 run.
“We say, ‘Keep the outside noise on the outside,’” Elliott said. “Everything we spoke about inside of our locker room is we have a good football team. We’ve just got to continuously grow and get better.
“Every single day, I reminded them and every single day we reminded our staff. Hey, we’re going to be OK. We’ve got to maneuver these waters,” the Panthers coach added. “They’re gonna be rough at this point in time, but we knew once we got in conference that we were going to be prepared and ready to go.”
The most valuable player of the TaxAct Camellia Bowl will receive the Bart Starr Trophy, named for the former University of Alabama and Green Bay Packers quarterback.
