Once upon a time in Sonoma State history there was a NCAC (Northern California Athletic Conference) Football Championship team. In 1991, the Sonoma State Cossacks went on to defeat the University of California, Davis 23-12 in the final to win the program’s only championship.

Very few people currently know about the football team, as its last official season was in 1996 with the team going 2-8. After that season the team was cut due to budget constraints and new Title IX regulations being put into place. The football team’s history started in 1969 but only lasted a short stint as in 1972 it was discontinued. Then again in 1980, the team was brought back again but this time as a club sport and then shortly in 1983 joined the NCAC. The team then existed for another 13 years till its demise.

Fast foward to today, it might be our love for sports here at the STAR or Super Bowl Mania taking over but we decided to dig deeper into the team. Ultimately we believe the football team should come back and even more after hearing some of the stories from former players from that 1991 championship-winning team.

Now to many, Sonoma State winning the championship in 1991 came as a surprise, some would even call it an anomaly but not to the players of that famous team, including our very own current SSU advisor Andre Bailey. Bailey was the starting running back on the team and was a focal part of the offense. We had the honor of interviewing Bailey and to say he was an integral part of this story is selling it short. Bailey is one of the most long-standing faculty members here at SSU and has been an immense part of the school’s culture.

A fundamental part of the team was its ferocious defense which was a complete team effort all around with players like Orlando Henry, Jason Drake, Sam Hernandez and Corey Cheney-Rice leading the way. “The practices were much harder than the games, the actual games themselves were easy man,” stated Bailey when talking about how good the team’s defense was.

According to Henry or also known as “Landy,” the defense was ranked top three in the nation and averaged four turnovers a game while only allowing 112 passing yards and 52 rushing yards in that 1991 season. “Our defense fed off big plays, we were like piranhas when you drop some meat into the water, everybody wanted to attack it,” said Henry. The team was always on their toes and never bowed down to a challenge, Bailey talked about how it felt going to other school’s homecoming games. “When we would go play homecoming games at other schools we ate their cake, it was no longer their party it was ours. Everyone on our team typically got to play and by the end of the third quarter the starters were out and the fans were chanting.”

Another reason the 1991 championship season was so special was that prior to that, UC Davis had won the past 20 championships in a row. “When we finally beat them (UC Davis) we made ESPN because they had the longest conference championship winning streak at that time,” said Henry. This meant so much to the team because the year before the team lost to UC Davis on a fumblerooski (trick play). Henry continued, “They beat us 12-7 on a trick play the previous year, so we were ready to get them back. When we beat them at Sonoma State there were over 4,000 people watching and it was like the biggest thing ever. I played with broken ribs, that’s how bad I wanted to beat them that game.”

The whole 1991 championship team is inducted into the Sonoma State Hall of Fame and will forever be remembered in the school’s history. But the stories of the team will only be remembered by those who were there to witness it or were lucky enough to hear them like we were here at the STAR. Stories like those of “Landy” and his reference to “year of the five” (wore number five) when referring to himself. Or how Bailey’s inspiration was a former All-American SSU football player, Mike Henry, and how he wanted to be just like him. These are reasons the STAR decided to write about the team, to find out the real history of the program.

The STAR believes football should make a return to our beautiful campus given how successful it was in such a short time. Football in the 90s at Sonoma State was “family” and Bailey stated it best himself, “It wasn’t just a culture of winning, it was a culture of support, all Sonoma State sports teams supported each other like a family.”