The Vicksburg Rotary Club hosted a Mississippi sports legend last week, when famed football coach Jim Carmody stopped by to promote his biography “Big Nasty.”

Often known as “Mississippi’s coach” due to having worked at Southern Miss, Mississippi State and Ole Miss, Carmody coached for 30 years and was best known for being the head coach of Southern Miss for five seasons from 1982-87. He was inducted into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame in 2009.

His teams were known for their defense, with his Southern Miss squads earning the nickname “The Nasty Bunch,” causing him to be dubbed “Big Nasty.”

Carmody shared some of his most memorable stories at the Rotary Club meeting to provide a glimpse into his book, such as being part of the Ole Miss team that defeated eventual national champion Notre Dame, coaching Brett Favre, and what is probably his biggest achievement, defeating Alabama and coach Bear Bryant in 1982.

The Golden Eagles beat Alabama 38-29 in Bryant-Denny Stadium, breaking the Crimson Tide’s 56-game home winning streak that had started in 1962.

“It was a big game, it was probably one of the biggest games of all time for Southern Miss,” Carmody said. “It’s probably right there among my top games. We started the book off with that. It’s the first chapter, so it was a top win for everybody.”

The whole idea for a biography of Carmody came from author Ron Borne. The book took years to finish, as Carmody and Borne lived in different towns and would meet up to discuss it when they could. Borne completed the book three days before his death in 2016.

“Big Nasty” is available at bookstores and on Amazon.

“Ron Borne was a longtime friend of mine from Oxford, and he started writing after he retired from the school of pharmacy where he was a professor,” Carmody said. “He had a couple of books before then, and he just hit me with it and I thought he was joking at first. I said I would be honored and he said let’s get it going.”

Included in the book is the story of Favre joining Southern Miss. Favre rarely threw the ball in high school, so Carmody told him if he couldn’t cut it at quarterback, he would be moved to defense. The first time Favre launched a pass downfield, Carmody said he could hear the ball whipping through the air, and immediately told his offensive coordinator that Favre was staying on offense.

Carmody also detailed his coaching philosophy.

“Making it should be important to you or you shouldn’t be doing it,” Carmody said. “If it’s important to you and it means a lot to you, then the players can see that.

“They can see that it means a lot to you, you’re not just putting in the hours, you’re there because it’s your life, it’s something you’ve wanted to do all of your life, and you’re doing it now and you’re going to do it the best you can, and then that rubs off on them,” Carmody continued. “If it’s important to you, it’ll be important to the players.”