Elijah Elgebra Williams (born August 20, 1975) is an American former college and professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

player who was a

defensive back In gridiron football, defensive backs (DBs), also called the secondary, are the players on the defensive side of the ball who play farthest back from the line of scrimmage. They are distinguished from the other two sets of defensive players, the ...

and

kick returner A return specialist or kick returner is a player on the special teams unit of a gridiron football team who specializes in returning punts and kickoffs. There are few players who are exclusively return specialists; most also play another position ...

in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL) for four seasons during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Williams played

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

for the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

, and thereafter he played professionally for the

Atlanta Falcons The Atlanta Falcons are a professional American football team based in Atlanta. The Falcons compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) South division. The Falcons joined th ...

of the NFL.

Early years

Williams was born in

Milton, Florida Milton is a city in and the county seat of Santa Rosa County, Florida, located in the Pensacola– Ferry Pass– Brent Metropolitan Statistical Area, also known as the Pensacola Metropolitan Area. Milton is located in the geographic center ...

in 1975.Pro-Football-Reference.com, Players
Elijah Williams
Retrieved March 24, 2011. He attended Milton High School,databaseFootball.com, Players
Elijah Williams
. Retrieved March 24, 2011. and played high school football for the Milton Panthers.

College career

Williams accepted an athletic scholarship to attend the

in Gainesville, Florida, where he was a

running back A running back (RB) is a member of the offensive backfield in gridiron football. The primary roles of a running back are to receive American football plays#Offensive terminology, handoffs from the quarterback to Rush (American football)#Offen ...

for coach

Steve Spurrier Stephen Orr Spurrier (born April 20, 1945) is an American former American football, football quarterback and coach who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 10 seasons before coaching for 38 years, primarily in college. He is often ...

Florida Gators football The Florida Gators football program represents the University of Florida (UF) in American college football. Florida competes in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Eastern Division of ...

teams from

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which Sinking of the MS Estonia, sank in ...

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of t ...

.
2011 Florida Gators Football Media Guide
'', University Athletic Association, Gainesville, Florida, pp. 99, 125, 138–140, 147–148, 186 (2011). Retrieved August 31, 2011. Memorably, he ran for 109 yards versus

LSU Tigers The LSU Tigers and Lady Tigers are the athletic teams representing Louisiana State University (LSU), a state university located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. LSU competes in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) as a ...

and 116 yards against the

Auburn Tigers The Auburn Tigers are the athletic teams representing Auburn University, a public four-year coeducational university located in Auburn, Alabama, United States. The Auburn Tigers compete in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Associa ...

in 1996 Williams led the Gators in rushing yardage in 1995 and 1996, and finished his four-year college career with 3,023 all-purpose yards—2,181 rushing and 842 receiving. During his four college seasons, the Florida Gators won

Southeastern conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities of ...

(SEC) championships in 1994, 1995 and 1996, and the 1996 national championship when they defeated the

Florida State Seminoles The Florida State Seminoles are the athletic teams representing Florida State University located in Tallahassee, Florida. They compete as a member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I level (Football Bowl Subdivis ...

52–20 in the

Sugar Bowl The Sugar Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in New Orleans, Louisiana. Played annually since January 1, 1935, it is tied with the Orange Bowl and Sun Bowl as the second-oldest bowl games in the country, surpassed onl ...

. He was chosen as a senior team captain in 1997. Williams returned to Gainesville when his NFL career was over, and graduated from the University of Florida with a bachelor's degree in health science education in 2003.

Professional career

The

chose Williams in the sixth round (166th pick overall) in the

1998 NFL Draft The 1998 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 18–19, 1998, at the Theater at M ...

. He played for the Falcons in fifty games over four seasons from to .National Football League, Historical Players
Elijah Williams
Retrieved March 24, 2011. He saw limited action as a running back, and played mostly on special teams as a kick returner and as a backup defensive back.

Life after the NFL

Williams worked as a high school football coach from 2005 to 2012. He was formerly the head coach for the Oak Ridge Pioneers football team of Oak Ridge High School in Orlando, Florida. He was also an assistant coach at Astronaut high school in Titusville, Fl. Elijah Williams
" ''Orlando Sentinel'' (August 21, 2012). Retrieved October 24, 2012. Williams is currently the head coach at Jones High School.

References

Bibliography

* Carlson, Norm, ''University of Florida Football Vault: The History of the Florida Gators'', Whitman Publishing, LLC, Atlanta, Georgia (2007). . * Golenbock, Peter, ''Go Gators! An Oral History of Florida's Pursuit of Gridiron Glory'', Legends Publishing, LLC, St. Petersburg, Florida (2002). . * Hairston, Jack, ''Tales from the Gator Swamp: A Collection of the Greatest Gator Stories Ever Told'', Sports Publishing, LLC, Champaign, Illinois (2002). . * McCarthy, Kevin M.,
Fightin' Gators: A History of University of Florida Football
', Arcadia Publishing, Mount Pleasant, South Carolina (2000). . * Nash, Noel, ed., ''The Gainesville Sun Presents The Greatest Moments in Florida Gators Football'', Sports Publishing, Inc., Champaign, Illinois (1998). . {{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Elijah 1975 births Living people People from Milton, Florida Players of American football from Florida American football defensive backs American football return specialists American football running backs Milton High School (Florida) alumni Florida Gators football players Atlanta Falcons players