Charlie Stukes
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Chesapeake, Virginia, U.S.
 | |||||||||||
| No. 47 | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Position | Cornerback | ||||||||||
| Personal information | |||||||||||
| Born | September 13, 1943 Chesapeake, Virginia, U.S. | ||||||||||
| Listed height | 6 ft 3 in (1.91 m) | ||||||||||
| Listed weight | 212 lb (96 kg) | ||||||||||
| Career information | |||||||||||
| High school | Crestwood (Chesapeake) | ||||||||||
| College | Maryland Eastern Shore | ||||||||||
| NFL draft | 1967: 4th round, 100th overall pick | ||||||||||
| Career history | |||||||||||
| Awards and highlights | |||||||||||
| Career NFL statistics | |||||||||||
| |||||||||||
Charlie Stukes (born September 13, 1943) is an American former professional football defensive back. He started in Super Bowl V for the Baltimore Colts. Stukes played college football for the Maryland Eastern Shore Hawks and was selected by the Colts in the fourth round of the 1967 NFL/AFL draft. He previously worked as an assistant principal at Oscar Smith High School in Chesapeake, Virginia. In 2016 he was working at the same school as an administrator.[1]
Stukes was born on September 13, 1943, in Chesapeake, Virginia.[2] He grew up in Bells Mills, and attended Crestwood High School, where he starred in football, basketball and baseball.[3][4] He was a quarterback on the football team.[5][6] Stukes was also a high-scoring basketball player on Crestwood's two-time state champion basketball team.[7]
College career
Stukes attended Maryland State College (now the University of Maryland Eastern Shore - UMES), an HBCU school that was part of the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (CIAA). He had been recruited by other CIAA schools (Morgan State, North Carolina A&T, and North Carolina Central), but chose Maryland State because young men he had played with in high school had gone there, and that influenced his decision. This included Clarence Clemons (a 2012 inductee into the Hawks Athletics Hall of Fame[8]), who went on to fame as the saxophonist with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.[3]
Stukes starred in both football and baseball, and played basketball as well. He played football and baseball under coach Roosevelt "Sandy" Gilliam.[3][4] Stukes was quarterback of the Hawks football team. When he graduated in 1967, he had passed for more yards than any quarterback in the school's history, and set a season record for touchdown passes.[9] Stukes also was All-CIAA three years as a defensive back.[4]
He was also a star player on the school's excellent baseball team, which won CIAA titles in 1966 and 1967.[10] As a junior (1966) he ranked fourth in the nation in hitting, and fifth in his senior year (1967). He had 40 runs batted in (RBI) in just 15 games as a junior. As a senior, he averaged 2.73 stolen bases per game (30 steals in 11 games), an NCAA Division II record. He was scouted by Syd Thrift of the Pittsburgh Pirates, but ultimately chose to play professional football after being drafted by the Baltimore Colts.[3][11]
When Stukes played for the Colts in Super Bowl III against the New York Jets in January 1969, four other Maryland State College players were on the Colts or Jets; the most players from any single school in that Super Bowl. These included three close contemporaries, Jim Duncan (drafted by the Colts in 1968),[12] Emerson Boozer (drafted by the Jets in 1966),[13] and Earl Christy (signed by the Jets in 1966),[14] along with veteran Johnny Sample (playing for the Jets, but originally drafted by the Colts in 1958).[15][16]
In 1982, Stukes was inducted into the University of Maryland Eastern Shore Hawks Athletics Hall of Fame for football.[8]