Interview with James Irwin, author of "Midnight in Chattanooga"

Interview with James Irwin
Mr. Irwin is currently the Assistant Director in the James Madison University Office of Alumni Relations.  He is also the author of Midnight in Chattanooga and former sports editor at the Washington Examiner.

By Brad Burgess and Ryan Hourigan, students in SRM 334: Introduction to Sport Media

Q: What compelled you to write your book, Midnight in Chattanooga?

A: I fell into a great situation when I was here [at JMU]. I applied to be sports editor at The Breeze and, for some reason, they hired me for it. And JMU [football] goes on this run that no one expected them to go on. Remember, the three seasons before 2004 they were 2-9, 5-7, and 6-6. They were getting better, but they didn't get one top 25 vote. They had a quarterback controversy coming into training camp. Mickey [Matthew]'s son Clayton had just been in second car accident. There was a lot of turmoil around here. Mickey was coaching for his job. Nobody really knew what to expect of that team. The went 2-1 out of the gate. They lost the game at West Virginia when they get drubbed, and West Virginia was No. 6 in the country. And then they won six straight. And they won these games in such dramatic fashion. Up until the day they won the national title, nobody really understood what was happening because nobody has ever experienced it here before. So when you roll all these things up and you look at a guy coaching for his job with the family situation that he had with Clayton's accidents, a quarterback controversy, a program that hadn't done anything in better than a decade, and all of a sudden, bang, the flip gets switched and they win a national championship. As a journalist, immediately I thought this can't be as overnight as it appears to be. So my mission in writing this book was to uncover the back story of how it happened. I wanted to show that it just wasn't an overnight success. Success is earned and [the 2004 JMU football team] embodied that.

Q: Why did you decide to come to JMU as an undergraduate student?

A: I'm from New York and went to a college fair at a local community college. I stopped by the JMU table and talked to Joe Manning in Admissions. Joe talked to me for 25 minutes. He got me to come down here in late March of my junior year. Everything looked great. The flowers are freshly planted, it's a 70 degree day, and the Quad is packed with people and they're having a great time. I fell in love with the place. I decided to come here, because it's where I felt at home.

Q: What dorm did you live in freshman year?

A: Gifford Hall.

Q: Who is your favorite athlete of all time?

A: I'm a huge Mariano Rivera fan. I think part of it is because his appreciation for the game. He's always composed. Rivera is so stoic and so calm and so deliberate. His pants are the right length, his hair is cut close to the scalp, and his ball cap is on completely straight as an arrow. He does the same thing every single time, he throws the same pitch every single time, and he's still the greatest closer of all time. He's incredibly passionate about the game, and he's very astute when it comes to the history and he appreciates it. I'm a huge Mariana Rivera fan, both because of the way he carries himself and because of his athletic ability.

Q: What would you say is the easiest sport to cover?

A: I don't want to say this in a way that makes it seems like it's trivial compared to the others. For me, soccer is very easy to cover. I played a little bit when I was a kid so I understand the basics of it. The field is so big, everything unfolds in front of you and the ball is big. You can usually see something developing in soccer a lot further away because of the space, and because you know what great teams do and how they function. If you cover a team for a long time, you know when a team likes to run. The players are very approachable compared to a lot of the other major sports.

Q: What's your most enjoyable sport to cover?

A: I really did enjoy covering football, but I enjoy covering pretty much any sport.

Q: What's your favorite sports team?

A: New York Yankees.

Q: What's your ultimate dream job?

A: I would love to spend my career just cutting 30 for 30 films. They are great.

Q: What's your favorite cereal?

A: Life

Q: E-Hall or D-Hall?

A: E-Hall

Q: Would you write another book?

A: Absolutely.

Q: What would the book be about?

A: The Electric Zoo, JMU men’s basketball from 1977-1990. I'm actually working on it.

Q: New York or Washington D.C.?

A: New York

Q: What's your favorite thing about JMU?

A: I love JMU's mission and the purpose of this university. It's very student-focused. The idea is to be an involved citizen, but at the core of that involved citizen is to get a great education. That's the most important thing a university can do, and I think we do a great job of making sure that's the focus here.