{"id":236,"date":"2016-03-14T14:20:26","date_gmt":"2016-03-14T18:20:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/2016\/03\/14\/purple-pride-in-the-sunshine-state\/"},"modified":"2022-11-06T20:59:00","modified_gmt":"2022-11-07T01:59:00","slug":"purple-pride-in-the-sunshine-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/purple-pride-in-the-sunshine-state\/","title":{"rendered":"Purple pride in the sunshine state"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/newsimg.furman.edu.s3.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/11.22-florida1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1178 aligncenter lazyload\" title=\"view from the stands (Summer Woods)\" data-src=\"http:\/\/newsimg.furman.edu.s3.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/11.22-florida1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 640px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 640\/480;\" \/><\/a>NOVEMBER 22, 2011<br \/>\nBy Chloe Kowalski &#8217;12, Contributing Writer<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The majority of the 84,674 fans clad in orange and blue were unsettled Saturday watching Furman offer play after play of surprisingly good football.<\/p>\n<p>Going nose to nose against\u00a0Southeastern Conference power Florida, the Paladins constructed a 22-7 second quarter lead.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Jerodis Williams scored the first touchdown for Furman\u00a0on a one-yard run, prompting\u00a0the team&#8217;s cheering\u00a0section to go wild. Purple pompoms punched the air and cries of &#8220;F-U aaaaalll the time!&#8221; rang out in a happy chorus.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Quarterback Chris Forcier pulled surprise plays out of his sleeve, which led to more touchdowns for Furman and more groans from Florida.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">While the Paladins did not give up, several long touchdown bombs, a 55-yard field goal, and\u00a0two interception returns for scores\u00a0eventually sealed the game\u2019s fate in the fourth quarter. Despite the 54-32 loss,\u00a0though, no one could deny\u00a0Furman\u2019s\u00a0effort. The contest was much closer than anyone expected.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">But the game\u00a0was not the only highlight of the\u00a0week.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">As the Paladins were preparing to face the Gators, admission counselors, members of the development staff, and President Smolla were executing their game plan. During the days leading up to the big game, the group criss-crossed the state to connect\u00a0with alumni, prospective students and friends of the university.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">In all, Furman\u00a0hosted 16 events over six days, including five alumni\/parent receptions, four classroom presentations, and a guidance counselor luncheon.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">About 160 Furman students made the nine-hour trip to Gainesville, 110 on charter buses. And more than 550 people took part in a pre-game Furman tailgate.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Months ago, university staff began crafting a\u00a0plan to\u00a0capitalize on the publicity generated by the game to educate Floridians about Furman. As the final whistle blew signaling the end of Saturday\u2019s\u00a0contest, the Paladins headed home knowing they had put in a solid effort, both on and off the field.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NOVEMBER 22, 2011<br \/>\nBy Chloe Kowalski &#8217;12, Contributing Writer<span style=\"font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: large;\"> <\/span><\/p>\n<p>The majority of the 84,674 fans clad in orange and blue were unsettled Saturday watching Furman offer play after play of surprisingly good football.<\/p>\n<p>Going nose to nose against\u00a0Southeastern Conference power Florida, the Paladins constructed a 22-7 second quarter lead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":237,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}