In the second of two Thursday night games Georgia Southern will play this season, the Eagles will play host to the Troy Trojans.

Troy University is located in Southeast Alabama and was founded in 1887 under the name Troy State Normal School.

The Trojan’s football program first began in 1909, but has been a continuous fixture in the school’s athletics since 1946. Troy has been in the Sun Belt Conference since 2004, and in that time period has won five conference championships from 2006-2010.

Before making their way to the Sun Belt, the Trojans spent three seasons as an FBS Independent school, going 17-18.

Troy has three national championships in the football program’s history, two of which were won at the Division II level in 1984 and 1987, and one at the NAIA level in 1968.

Larry Blakeney is in his 23rd and final season as head coach for the Trojans, and has the most wins in Troy history with 174.

Along with that, he has the third most victories for a college coach in the state of Alabama, just surpassing former Auburn coach Shug Jordan.

This season is an off year for Troy as they currently are 1-7, something unusual to a program that has an all time record of 504-378-37.

Troy has had some notable coaches and players to be a part of their program, including former Georgia Tech and Buffalo Bill head coach Chan Gailey, who lead the Trojans to the 1984 Division II championship.

DeMarcus Ware and Osi Umenyiora are two well known names in the NFL that hail from Troy.

Ware was selected 11th overall in the 2005 NFL Draft by the Dallas Cowboys, and holds the all time franchise sacks record for them with 117. Currently he plays for the Denver Broncos and is 15th all-time in sacks in NFL history.

Umenyiora was drafted in 2003 by the New York Giants in the 2nd round, 56th pick overall, and holds the Giants’ record for most sacks in a single game with six. Currently he plays for the Atlanta Falcons and has 83.5 sacks, placing him in the top 50 of all-time.

Despite the down year for Troy this season, this is historically a very successful team in the Sun Belt and the game will be a good matchup between two teams with a pedigree for success this Thursday.