Feb. 6, 2003

Columbia, SC - HIS BROTHERS BLAZED the trail to The Citadel and left some big shoes to fill. One played football for three years, the other gave up the game after one season and instead became a company commander at the military college.

"I had a lot to live up to," Jack Douglas says.

He did.

Jack Douglas, quarterback extraordinaire, sparked the Bulldogs to some of their finest hours in football: victories over South Carolina and Arkansas and the No. 1 ranking in the NCAA Division I-AA poll in 1992. He did not stop there; today, 10 years later, he is an active member of the Brigadier Foundation's board of directors.

"Has it really been 10 years?" he says, laughing.

Today, Douglas works as a market research manager for First Citizens Bank and lives in the Irmo area with wife Vince and sons Reed and Cole. He dabbles in broadcasting, which started with doing color on high school games and evolved into some television work on regional college games.

He tried a triathlon last year and laughs, saying "I barely got out of the water" for the swimming portion of the competition that has running and cycling to follow.

"I help out a little with a youth league football team," he says, "but I mostly work with my sons' soccer teams" in the Irmo area.

Football for the youngsters? "I'm trying to teach them to throw," he says.

No option? Forgoing the style that he worked so masterfully?

"No, that's pretty much going away," he says, then looks back and adds, "I don't have individual memories so much as I remember the feeling that we knew we could beat anybody. We knew if we were in the game in the fourth quarter, we would win."

That the Bulldogs did, using a 10-3 win over Arkansas for a springboard to an 11-2 joyride that ended in the I-AA quarterfinals.

Along the way, they posted especially satisfying victories over Army, Appalachian State and Furman.

Coach Charlie Taaffe used the wishbone offense, an option attack that has gone the way of the horse and buggy. But Douglas made it purr like a new Lexus.

He set a bushel of school records, reaped numerous honors and became one of four Bulldogs to have his jersey retired.

"It was a lot more than me," he says, pointing out that the offense did not score in the win over Arkansas. "We had a veteran team. Four (other seniors) had red-shirted with me, so we had five years together. It was as if we had five coaches on the field."

A native of North Charleston, he calls choosing The Citadel "a no-brainer." In addition to following his brothers, he wanted a small school that ran an option offense.

Maybe that old-fashioned offense would be back in style if a team had a Jack Douglas at the controls.

RESUME: -- Led The Citadel to a No. 1 ranking in Division I-AA football in 1992.

FAMOUS FOR: -- One of four Citadel football players to have his jersey retired.

CURRENTLY: -- Douglas, 32, is market research manager for First Citizens Bank and lives in the Irmo area.