– Legendary NFL head coaches Don Shula and Dan Reeves will serve as the head coaches for the 2007 Dell East-West Shrine All-Star Game, it was announced today.
The announcement marks a significant change for the game. In years past, the coaching staffs were comprised of college coaches. Shula and Reeves will be aided by NFL assistant coaches.
The 2007 Dell East-West Shrine All-Star Game will be played in
on Saturday, January 20, 2007, with a scheduled kickoff time of 6:00 p.m. CST at Reliant Stadium and will be televised live on ESPN2. The annual college all-star game has raised more than $14 million since 1925 to help support the Shriners Hospitals for Children.
Shula retired after the 1995 season as the NFL's all-time winningest coach with 347 career regular- and post-season victories. He was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1997. Shula is one of five coaches to lead two different teams to the Super Bowl, along with Reeves, Mike Holmgren, Bill Parcells and Dick Vermeil.
Shula guided the Baltimore Colts to Super Bowl III before leading the Miami Dolphins to berths in Super Bowls VI, VII and VIII.
. His 1972 Dolphins team achieved the only perfect season in NFL history, capping a 17-0 season with a 14-7 victory over the Redskins in Super Bowl VII.
Reeves coached in a record nine Super Bowls as both an assistant and head coach, and he joins Shula on the short list of coaches who coached two different teams to the Super Bowl. As a player/coach on Tom Landry's Dallas Cowboys staff, Reeves was part of back-to-back Super Bowl teams, falling to
.
In 1981, Reeves became the head coach of the Broncos, and guided his team to three Super Bowls in four years and berths in Super Bowls XXI, XXII and XXIV. In 1993, Reeves was named head coach of the New York Giants and he took them from 6-10 the year before to 11-5 in his first season, earning AP Coach of the Year honors. Reeves was named head coach of the Atlanta Falcons in 1996 and accomplished an even more impressive turnaround, taking over a 3-13 team and coaching them to a 14-2 record two years later. That 1998 team played in Super Bowl XXXIII, where his squad fell to his former team, the Broncos. Reeves retired with an overall record of 201-174-2, including an 11-9 record in the playoffs.
Hundreds of East-West Shrine Game alumni have gone on to play in the National Football League, including current Houston Texans DE Jason Babin, who played in the game in 2004, C Drew Hodgdon, who played in the 2005 game, and RB Wali Lundy, who played in the game last year. 57 Shrine Game alumni have gone on to be enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, including Doak Walker, John Elway and Bob Lilly. Other notable alumni include President Gerald Ford, Indianapolis Colts head coach Tony Dungy and Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre.
The game will bring together over 100 of the top collegiate players in
area for a week of activities. One of the annual highlights of the East-West Shrine Game is the players' visit to local Shriners hospitals.
Over 770,000 children have been helped in the 83-year history of the Shriners
Hospitals for Children. The hospitals serve patients under the age of 18 that
need spinal cord, orthopedic and burn care and are unable to pay. The Shriners
provide $1.7 million in free medical care each day at 22 hospitals nationwide.
