Bio

Kenneth Borries

Mississippi Gulf Coast Junior College (1966-1967) / Football
Gautier, Mississippi

They say records are meant to be broken. But for Kenneth Borries, one record was meant to be set. Before the Gautier native came to Perk, the school and never had a running back run for 1,000 yards in a season.

“Lots of great running backs played at Perk before I got there,” Borries said. “I was surprised that none of them ever got to the 1,000-yard mark.”

But before he could set out to achieve his goal, Borries had to make the team.

“I was running track at Pascagoula High School and Gulf Coast head football coach George Sekul invited me to try out for the football team,” he said. “I ended up getting a scholarship, but I played defensive back as a freshman in 1966.”

During that season, Gulf Coast broke at 17-game losing streak against Pearl River by walloping its archrival 33-0 en route to a 10-2 record and the state championship, the college’s first since 1948.

The following year as a sophomore, Borries got his chance to play running back on a team that made history before the season ever began. Sekul recalls at the signing of Josh Wells, Glenn Larkin and Morris Richardson, all of Pascagoula, represented the first time in state history that black men played football at a previously all-white college.

For Borries and all of his teammates, more history would be made in 1967. Once again the Bulldogs whipped Pearl River 27-7, and once again the team won the state title. It marked the first and only time in the 20th century that a Gulf Coast football team took back-to-back state titles. Borries, in his coveted position as the Bulldogs running back, ran roughshod over opposing defenses. The 6-foot-1, 195-pounder carried the ball 183 times for 1,006 yards and 16 touchdowns, and earned the team’s Most Valuable Player award for 1967.  What might be more impressive is this: During the ’67 season, Borries did not fumble the ball once — that’s 183 times taking a handoff and being hit by defenders coming from all directions.

“My position coach was Ken ‘Curly’ Farris,” Borries said. “At the beginning of the season, he told me to never fumble the ball. That stuck with me throughout the season, because one thing you didn’t want to do was make Coach Farris mad.”

In 2007, Borries is being inducted into the Gulf Coast Athletic Hall of Fame alongside his Bulldog teammate quarterback Clell Rosetti.

“Of course, Clell handed the ball to me many times,” he said. “As our quarterback, he always inspired us. He was always keeping us up during games, just like a good quarterback is supposed to do.”

Another source of inspiration for Borries came courtesy of his head coach, George Sekul.

“Coach Sekul also inspired us,” he said. “We didn’t dread playing football; we were inspired to play thanks to Coach.”

After his days at Perk, Borries went on to play fullback at the University of North Carolina under head coach Bill Dooley, another Gulf Coast Hall of Famer. As a junior with the Tar Heels, he said some of his more memorable games were wins over Florida, Vanderbilt and Duke.

The next season, his senior year, Borries played closer to home at Mississippi College in Clinton.

“That was fun,” Borries said. “I got to play with 16 of my former Perk teammates.”