11-0, and Nowhere to Go

Be sure to be in your seat at the end of the first quarter Saturday as more than 30 members of A-State’s 1975 Football team will be on the field to commemorate the 50th anniversary of their undefeated season.

Note: This feature story was originally published in the 2025 edition of Hooten’s Arkansas Football

By Caleb Garner

It sounds absurd in today’s college football landscape, but Arkansas State ended its 1975 football season with an 11-0 record and no bowl invitation.

Think about it. An 11-0 record, and nowhere to go. Last year, there were 46 postseason opportunities for Division I teams, including 11 such games in the first 12-team College Football Playoff. 

That was not the case 50 years ago, when a winning record, not to mention an undefeated record, guaranteed nothing.

There were 11 bowl games in 1975, and those spots were limited for college football’s top teams, not the winner of the newly-minted Southland Conference.

A-State’s snub was not in vain. The Southland Conference petitioned the NCAA for a bowl tie-in, leading to the birth of the Independence Bowl in Shreveport, La. The game was first played in 1976 to commemorate America’s Bicentennial celebration and continues to this day.

Yes, there was the disappointment of not being rewarded with a bowl game after such a magical season, but defensive lineman Robert Speer recalls the togetherness the team enjoyed.

“We all lived in the football dorm together back then,” Speer said. “We all bonded.”

Linebacker Jerry Muckensturm, who went on to a lengthy NFL career with the Chicago Bears, echoed Speer’s sentiments of the team’s camaraderie, which continues as the years roll on.

“Not only were we teammates, but we were also friends,” Muckensturm said. “We got that close to each other, and we knew that if I was getting beat, the guys next to me was going to be there for me. Working together was so important because we knew each other and wanted the other person to succeed.”

HIGH HOPES

The 1975 Arkansas State football team was well-positioned for the transition from the College Division (Division-II) to the Division-I tier – known as the University Division. Five years removed from a College Division crown and 11-0 finish under then-head coach Bennie Ellender, fifth-year head coach Bill “Bull” Davidson’s team was coming off 7-3 seasons in 1973 and 1974.

Davidson’s Indians, as ASU was known then, returned 10 starters on defense, but safety David Hines transitioned to the quarterback role. Linebackers Muckensturm and Mike Malham, Jr., played behind a stellar defensive front led by Speer, Jimmy Lisko and Lodie Dixon. 

The defense was expected to be stout, and it was.

“We went into the season knowing that defense was good, because most of us started as sophomores,” said Malham, who went on to an illustrious career as a high school coach at Cabot, posting 301 wins in 37 years, tied for second all-time in the state.

The Malham connection ran deep at ASU in 1975, with Malham’s father, Mike Malham Sr., in the midst of a 19-year run as the program’s defensive coordinator. 

“We were all three-year starters, so we knew we were going to have a good defense,” Malham Jr., said. “Our offense was the question. We had a quarterback who was unproven and some JUCO transfers, but the offensive line turned out to be really, really good.”

Hines was not as proven as a passer, but he proved to be more than capable of running A-State’s veer option offense that showcased an all-new backfield, setting up a dynamic offensive season. The Indians ranked sixth nationally in scoring (32.3 points per game), with Hines second nationally with 102 points scored. 

Hines, one of nearly 50 Arkansans on the team, had last played quarterback for Malham, Sr., at McClellan High School in Little Rock.

“(Hines) went back there and played like he never missed a beat,” Speer said. “He took over the team and leadership and ran that option like a pro.”

SETTING THE TONE

Arkansas State started the season with a 42-0 win over Northwestern State (La.) in Jonesboro. Hines rushed for four touchdowns; the defense, which ended up third nationally in points allowed (7.4 points per game) made it through the first of six games without surrendering a touchdown.

Week 2 ended with a 23-6 win over Idaho. The Indians controlled the game with their rushing attack, which ended No. 1 in the nation with 340.5 yards per game.

A 24-7 road win over McNeese followed, as ASU relied on its powerful offensive line – which included All-Americans and NFL draft picks Kenny Jones and TJ Humphreys. Jones had a stellar career with the Buffalo Bills, while Humphreys pursued a medical career.

Dennis Bolden rushed for 250 yards against McNeese, en route to leading the conference with 1,191 yards and 11 touchdowns.

IRON SHARPENING IRON

Hines said the offense benefited from going against A-State’s talented defense.

“The toughest team we ever played on defense was Muckensturm and Malham and Dixon,” Hines said, “and that secondary at Arkansas State who we went against in spring and then again in August. It amazes me to watch film of that defense.”

The defense benefited from defending the option in practice and was also helped by the offense’s ability to control the ball.

“We weren’t very worried about 3-and-outs, because they just slowly drove the ball down the field,” Muckensturm said. “We had David Hines, you had Dennis Bolden, and you had (fullback) Leroy Harris in the backfield, as well as these great offensive linemen. When we practiced, I never liked going against our offense because they're so good at running the ball.”

KEEPING UP THE MOMENTUM

Arkansas State took care of business in Week 4, traveling to the Liberty Bowl and posting a 29-10 victory over Memphis State in front of nearly 28,000 fans. The Tigers were two weeks removed from a 31-20 win at then-seventh-ranked Auburn.

“(Defeating Memphis) was kind of the big turnaround right there,” Muckensturm remembers. “A lot of people assume that they were going to destroy us. But we really kind of dominated them. I think it was something that the coaches from that point on we're thinking, ‘Okay, we’ve got something special here. If we just can keep our heads on right and just keep on playing the way we can, we can do something special.’” 

The Indians avoided a letdown in a 39-17 comeback win on Homecoming against Southwestern Louisiana (now Louisiana), rallying from a 17-7 deficit with a run of 32 unanswered points. A 50-yard touchdown run by Hines ignited the rally. 

ASU followed with a 14-9 win at Cincinnati, with Hines accounting for the go-ahead fourth-quarter score on a QB sneak on a cold, rainy day.

“The buzz was, ‘are these guys for real?’ early on,” Hines recalls. “This is no cliché, but we really didn’t know any better. We went in each game and competed and had a strong feeling we were going to win, especially because of our defense. We had an all-new offensive backfield, but it proved to be the best in the nation at running the ball. When we went to Memphis, nobody gave us a chance. But we went there and did our normal stuff. Roy Painter runs back an interception for a touchdown, Dan Mullen kicked a couple of field goals. It was a shock to people in Northeast Arkansas but also in Tennessee, and then we go to Cincinnati and win. Those were two big obstacles that told folks that this team was pretty good.”

A-State posted consecutive shutout wins at Lamar (17-0) and at home against UT-Chattanooga (48-0). The defense held Lamar to fewer than 200 yards, while Lisko shined against the Moccasins, recording one of his eight blocked punts that season. The Indians blocked 11 punts as a team, an NCAA record that still stands. 

The Indians’ record reached 9-0 with a 35-12 win over Southern Illinois at Warm Memorial Stadium in Little Rock.

Arkansas State then celebrated Senior Day in the rain in Jonesboro with a 54-7 demolition of conference foe UT Arlington. Harris rushed for three TDs, and Hines added a TD run and 25-yard scoring pass to wideout Stan Winfrey. The touchdown pass was a rare occurrence in a season dominated by defense and running the ball. 

Week 11 should have put the country on notice as they traveled to Ruston, La., to play a Louisiana Tech team that had won three consecutive Division II titles. 

“We started drawing a lot of attention, and going in the last game of the year, it was made for a movie,” Speer said. “That's what it's supposed to be like: the two best teams. Of course, Louisiana Tech was the best of the best back then. They were winning the national championship just about every year.”

The Indians countered the Bulldogs’ high-octane passing game with its methodical ground assault and opportunistic defense to win 30-13 in Ruston.

“11 AND 0, AND NOWHERE TO GO”

Few would argue about the quality of Arkansas State’s season, but voters in the Associated Press poll and Coaches poll never bought in.

ASU not only never cracked the AP Top 20, as it was known back then, but it was never among those receiving votes, and the Indians would not have cracked a Top 25 list. 

They did receive some notice. The Tangerine Bowl in Orlando, Fla., had listed the unbeaten Indians as one of its potential selections, but ultimately chose 7-4 South Carolina to face then-9-1 Miami (Ohio) – a game that saw the Gamecocks fall 20-7.

Muckensturm says the closeness the team developed has continued for almost a half century and helps ease any pain the players might still feel from the bowl omission.

“We keep in touch even now,” he said. “There's a group text, we text each other, and there's guys who can remember the exact team and exact play. There's this continuation of talking about it amongst us and as you get older, we realize that we really did have something that not what a lot of players can really say that they experienced. We went undefeated, and you couldn't do any better than that. We didn't have a bowl game, yet we’re keeping in contact with each other, and they come down for homecoming, and we get to talk about the old times, and it really gets better as the years go by.”