The 1995 Idaho Vandals football team represented the

University of Idaho The University of Idaho (U of I, or UIdaho) is a public land-grant research university in Moscow, Idaho. It is the state's land-grant and primary research university,, and the lead university in the Idaho Space Grant Consortium. The University ...

in the

1995 NCAA Division I-AA football season The 1995 NCAA Division I-AA football season, part of college football in the United States organized by the National Collegiate Athletic Association at the Division I-AA level, began in August 1995, and concluded with the 1995 NCAA Division I-AA ...

. The

Vandals The Vandals were a Germanic peoples, Germanic people who first inhabited what is now southern Poland. They established Vandal Kingdom, Vandal kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula, Mediterranean islands, and North Africa in the fifth century. The ...

, led by first-year head coach

Chris Tormey Christopher Joseph Tormey (born May 1, 1955) is a former American football coach. Formerly the head coach at and Nevada Wolf Pack football, Nevada and Idaho Vandals football, Idaho, his alma mater, Tormey was an assistant coach for 16 seasons at ...

, were members of the

Big Sky Conference The Big Sky Conference (BSC) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the NCAA's Division I with football competing in the Football Championship Subdivision. Member institutions are located in the western United States in the eigh ...

and played their home games at the

Kibbie Dome The William H. Kibbie-ASUI Activity Center (commonly known as the Kibbie Dome) is a multi-purpose indoor athletic stadium in the northwest United States, on the campus of the University of Idaho in Moscow, Idaho. It is the home of the Idaho V ...

, an indoor facility on campus in

Moscow, Idaho Moscow ( ) is a city in North Central Idaho, United States. Located along the state border with Washington, it had a population of 25,435 at the 2020 census. The county seat and largest city of Latah County, Moscow is the home of the Universit ...

. Idaho finished the regular season at 6–4 and 4–3 in the Big Sky, their final season in the conference for more than two decades. Idaho defeated rival

Boise State Boise State University (BSU) is a public research university in Boise, Idaho. Founded in 1932 by the Episcopal Church, it became an independent junior college in 1934 and has been awarding baccalaureate and master's degrees It became a publ ...

for the thirteenth time in Since

1978 Events January * January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213. * January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of Republican People's Party, CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd go ...

, the Vandals' football uniforms made prominent use of yellow gold which continued through this season. With the move to up Division I-A in

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...

, the shade of

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...

was changed

Division I-AA playoffs

After a slow start, the Vandals defeated the top teams in the conference to make the I-AA playoffs for the fourth consecutive season, and the tenth time in eleven seasons under four head For the second straight year, Idaho traveled to

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

to play

McNeese State McNeese State University is a public university in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Founded in 1939 as Lake Charles Junior College, it was renamed McNeese Junior College after John McNeese, an early local educator. The present name was adopted in 1970. ...

in the first round; the Cowboys were top-ranked this year and won again, this time by Conference champion

Montana Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...

lost to Idaho in the Kibbie Dome in mid-season, then went on to win the national championship; it was the Vandals' first win over the Griz since

1990 File:1990 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1990 FIFA World Cup is played in Italy; The Human Genome Project is launched; Voyager I takes the famous Pale Blue Dot image- speaking on the fragility of Humankind, humanity on Earth, Astroph ...

Notable players and coaches

Junior defensive end

Ryan Phillips Ryan Phillips (born November 15, 1982) is the defensive coordinator for the BC Lions of the Canadian Football League (CFL) and a former professional Canadian football defensive back. He played most of his career with the BC Lions, where he has ...

was a four-year starter; he moved to outside linebacker as a senior in 1996, and was selected in the third round of the

1997 NFL Draft The 1997 NFL Draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held April 19–20, 1997, at the Paramount T ...

by the

New York Giants The New York Giants are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Giants compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East division. ...

. He played five seasons in the NFL, including

Super Bowl XXXV Super Bowl XXXV was an American football game between the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Baltimore Ravens and the National Football Conference (NFC) champion New York Giants to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion for ...

in January

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...

. Future Idaho head coach

Nick Holt Nicholas Holt VSpokesman-Review'' - Washington State Employee Salaries - Assistant football coach employees - Univ. of Washington - 2010 compensation - accessed 2011-12-31 (born October 15, 1962) is an American football coach who is currently the ...

stayed on the staff as defensive coordinator. New head coach Tormey was an alumnus from

Spokane Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Ca ...

who played defense for the Vandals in the mid-1970s, and was the defensive line coach under

Dennis Erickson Dennis Brian Erickson (born March 24, 1947) is an American football coach who most recently served as the head coach for the Salt Lake Stallions of the Alliance of American Football league. He was also the head coach at the University of Idaho ( ...

1982 Events January * January 1 – In Malaysia and Singapore, clocks are adjusted to the same time zone, UTC+8 (GMT+8.00). * January 13 – Air Florida Flight 90 crashes shortly after takeoff into the 14th Street bridges, 14th Street Bridge in ...

and

1983 The year 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to Internet protocol suite, TCP/IP is officially completed (this is consid ...

. He had spent the previous eleven seasons at

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered on ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

under head coaches Don James and

Jim Lambright James Ralph Lambright (April 26, 1942 – March 29, 2020) was an American football player and coach. He served as the head coach at the University of Washington for six seasons, from 1993 to 1998, compiling a record of Prior to becoming head c ...

. First-year offensive coordinator

George Yarno George Anthony Yarno (August 12, 1957 – August 8, 2016) was a professional football player, a guard for ten seasons in the National Football League with Tampa Bay, Atlanta, and Houston. He also played two seasons with the Denver Gold of the USF ...

moved over from neighboring

Washington State Washington (), officially the State of Washington, is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. Named for George Washington—the first U.S. president—the state was formed from the western part of the Washington ...

, his alma mater, where he was the offensive line coach under

Mike Price Michael Bruce Price (born April 6, 1946) is a former American football coach. He was the head coach at Weber State College from 1981 to 1988, Washington State University from 1989 to 2002, and the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) from 2004 ...

Schedule

Roster

References

External links

''Gem of the Mountains:'' 1996 University of Idaho yearbook
– 1995 football season

– student newspaper – 1995 editions {{1995 Division I-AA football playoff navbox

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Montana and Wyom ...

Idaho Vandals football seasons

Idaho Vandals football The Idaho Vandals are the college football team that represents the University of Idaho and plays its home games at the Kibbie Dome, an indoor facility on campus in Moscow, Idaho. Idaho is a member of the Big Sky Conference in the Football Cham ...