Copyright The Philadelphia Inquirer
The HBCU Classic at Lincoln Financial Field on Oct. 30 between Michael Vick’s Norfolk State and DeSean Jackson’s Delaware State far exceeded Tony Allen’s expectations. Allen, Delaware State’s president since 2020, knew when the game was announced earlier this year that the Hornets’ on-campus stadium wouldn’t fit the expected crowd for the matchup between teams coached by two former Eagles. Jackson recommended the Linc as a potential site, and after considering other options, the university decided it was the best place to have the game against Norfolk State. With the help of Frank Gumienny, the Eagles’ chief operating officer, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, and others, the game was a success. » READ MORE: How Michael Vick and DeSean Jackson are navigating the ‘culture shock’ of coaching at an HBCU “We all kind of agreed that if we filled that first bowl at the bottom of the stadium, which was somewhere [around] 28,000 people, that would be significant success for us,” Allen said in a telephone interview. “So to land at 47,266 [people], with a college fair and a step show and a career fair, folks from across the HBCU ecosystem ... it felt like a classic. It really did. “Now we are thinking about what this looks like annually,” Allen added, “[and] making sure that we can uplift the HBCU ecosystem and in a city where the suburbs birthed the first two HBCUs in the country in Cheney and Lincoln.” Delaware State (now 7-3) came away with a 27-20 win against Norfolk State in front of a crowd that was mostly Hornets fans. The Linc’s staff made it feel like a home game for the program, from a pregame light show to painting the end zones and the midfield logo in the Hornets colors. Allen says he’s “quite bullish on this becoming an annual affair” at the Linc, and the Eagles shared a similar sentiment. “The Philadelphia Eagles have shared that they look forward to the possibility of hosting another HBCU Classic in light of the success and popularity that last week’s game garnered at Lincoln Financial Field,” the team said in a statement to The Inquirer. After beating his former teammate on Oct. 30, the former Eagles receiver Jackson called the environment “surreal” and added that “it was a great turnout.” “I definitely do hope we continue to come back here, playing in a great environment like this,” Jackson said after the win. “It was crazy, man, because leading up to it, I was like, ‘It’s about to rain and people ain’t going to want to come sit in the rain,’ and God blessed us, man. It was a good game.” » READ MORE: Boisterous DeSean Jackson gets the best of stoic Michael Vick during ‘surreal’ HBCU showdown at the Linc Allen said he “had good conversations with [Mayor Parker] and Frank [Gumienny] about it. [I] haven’t talked to them at length since the game, but I know they were both quite pleased with what we were able to see and highlight and certainly see it as good for the city of Philadelphia. “When you think about where games like this are played, meaning classics or classic-like kind of affairs, they’re usually in the South. … I just think that to bring this to what effectively is the Mid-Atlantic Northeast, where you have some rich, rich traditions, but didn’t necessarily have the volume that you could see in the Deep South, I think it’s really, really important here." Vick, whose Norfolk State team fell to 2-9 with a loss last weekend, had a different sentiment. “No,” Vick said postgame about making the HBCU Classic an annual one at the Linc, before adding with a smile, “It felt more like a home game for them.”
