How did Florida State schedule East Texas A&M?

The first thing East Texas A&M Athletic Director Jim Curry will do when his flight lands in Tallahassee is to visit the family’s dentist.

“That seems crazy doesn’t it?” the affable Curry laughed at himself.

Crazy until you realize Curry was Florida State’s senior associate athletic director for nearly a decade before being hired by the aspiring east Texas school in March of 2023. It was during those final days in garnet and gold, while Curry was wrapping up his duties at Florida State, that he noticed a common open date on the schedules, which would benefit both employers.

“Yes,” Curry said, remembering the moment. “When I handed the schedule off two years ago to Bruce Warrick, we (FSU) already had Alabama booked, Kent State booked, so I let Mike know that there might be a school an hour outside Dallas that has an open week in the schedule and that he needed an FCS game in 2025.”

That school an hour outside Dallas, not far from where Norvell grew up, was Texas A&M – Commerce, as it was formerly known.

“Scheduling has always been a collaborative effort between football and the athletic director,” Curry said. Once Norvell and Warwick agreed on the game, it had to be agreed to by athletic director Michael Alford.

Curry explained that when it comes to scheduling, guys like he and Warrick, will do the exploratory work before getting Norvell and Alford involved.

An example of Curry’s scheduling, as our Osceola readers may remember, was when Florida State scheduled Duquesne as its week 0 opponent in 2022. It was Curry who came up with the idea and, while the man on the street couldn’t understand why FSU would ever play Duquesne in anything but basketball, Curry explained the hidden benefits to Osceola’s readers.

It was good to catch up with Curry this week and reminisce on his impact here at Florida State. In addition to his scheduling contributions, Curry oversaw the football, women's basketball, soccer, and men's and women's tennis programs. Those programs combined for 21 postseason appearances, including the Women's Soccer National Championship in 2021, feathering Curry’s resume among the pool of candidates when that ETA&M job came open.

Curry also launched FSU’s first NIL initiative in 2021 while overseeing facilities, event operations and the equipment staff.

The Curry clan is flying in early so the wife and kids can catch up with old Tally friends, while he visits with his former colleagues and focuses on his new responsibilities.

After all this is a business trip for he and his new employer.

“Our coach and our players are crazy excited to be coming to play a ranked Florida State team in Doak Campbell Stadium,” he said.

Remember, East Texas A&M, a campus of 13,000 students and a 2017 Division II national champion, wasn’t officially elevated to Division I until June 2025.

“We were provisional Division I members the last three years,” Curry said. “We were able to meet the four-year requirement in three,” he said.

The back-to-back games against SMU and FSU are absolutely a financial shot in the arm for the budget, Curry said.

“Normally it’s not desirable to schedule two FBS games in one year and we already had FSU on the 2025 schedule, so when SMU joined the ACC the opportunity came up to play them too, which gave us an opportunity to play in Dallas, which is our market, and to play in Florida.”

It was an opportunity he couldn’t pass.

While they are money games for ETA&M, Curry notes, “The financial component does work both ways.”

And he should know as he’s worked on both sides of those contracts.

“The FCS schools you can pay a little less guarantee than a second Group of 5 opponent and they don’t count any less toward making the playoffs,” he said.

Curry said the Lions will receive $450,000 for this game, which is at least $700,000 less than what FSU would typically pay for a group of six school that might not sell any more tickets than this game will.

“Some schools, like Texas, won’t play an FCS school as a matter of principle,” Curry said. “These games are important for us. It doesn’t float the whole budget but it’s a good tranche. And playing two of these games in the same year gives us more flexibility in our budget to do things throughout the department, including things like new helmets and shoulder pads for football.”

When you look at ETA&M’s 105-man roster, you’ll see that 75 percent of it is Texas born and bred. And why not? The Lone Star State has produced more college football players than all but a few states. “There’s so much talent around us with 75 percent of the state champions coming from within four hours of campus. Plus, if we don’t sign them coming out of high school, we’re a very viable option if they sign somewhere else first as most players who enter the portal transfer to a school close to home.”

In addition to prep talent, ETA&M recruits junior college players from Mississippi. “And we have a very strong junior college system here in Texas, too, so we have a lot of ponds to fish in,” Curry added.

“And now that we are a Division I school that is playoff-eligible, it helps our recruiting,” he said. “We found it hard to attract Division I transfers before we were playoff-eligible. In the last couple of years we’ve had a draft pick and been able to prove we can develop players who have moved on to (Power 4 schools).

Located in one of the fastest growing areas of the country, Curry thinks the two programs share ambitious visions. As Division I certification approached, Curry said their donor base increased by 250 percent. The donors who travelled to Dallas for the SMU game, which started well after the FSU v Alabama game, were glued to the game.

“They couldn’t stop talking about that game and the game this weekend,” he said. ”You could hear how loud it was.”

Other than the dentist office, what building does Curry most want to see?

“I’m looking forward to seeing the capital projects that were just getting off the ground when I was here, the stadium and the football operations building, which I’ve heard a lot about,” he said. “I remember when College Town was just industrial warehouses and now look at it.”

But it’s not the buildings he’s most excited to see.

“Tallahassee is a great town, no doubt about it, but it is the people that make the place,” he said.

Especially, that family dentist.

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