Jim Collier, who became a key Arkansas receiver in the early 1960s before spending 15 seasons on LSU’s coaching staff, has died at 87.
The LSU athletics department announced this week that Collier died Sept. 13 at his home on Lake D’Arbonne in Farmerville, Louisiana. His obituary said he had chronic heart failure complicated by advanced prostate cancer.
At Arkansas, Collier was part of three Southwest Conference championship teams under Frank Broyles and earned All-SWC honors in 1960 and 1961. He lined up at receiver with Lance Alworth, the Pro Football Hall of Famer, and made his biggest impact in the program’s biggest games.
In 1960, Collier paced the Razorbacks with 17 catches for 356 yards and three touchdowns. As a senior in 1961, he finished second to Alworth with 10 receptions for 139 yards and two scores. The Dallas Morning News named him the SWC’s most valuable player that season.
His junior year brought several defining plays during Arkansas’ 8-3, 6-1 SWC run to an outright league title. He caught a 9-yard touchdown pass on the final play of the first half and later hauled in a 37-yard reception that set up another score in a 24-23 victory at No. 11 Texas in Austin.
Three weeks after that, Collier delivered again. His 46-yard catch to the Rice 18 set up Mickey Cissell’s 26-yard game-winning field goal with 30 seconds left in a 3-0 win over the 10th-ranked Owls in Little Rock.
He also came through in 1961, catching a 4-yard touchdown pass in the fourth quarter to close out Arkansas’ 23-13 upset of ninth-ranked Baylor in Waco.
The New York Giants selected Collier in the seventh round of the 1961 NFL Draft, and he went on to play two professional seasons. His lone touchdown in the 1962 NFL Championship Game at Yankee Stadium came the hard way: he recovered a blocked punt in the end zone in the third quarter during the Giants’ 16-7 loss to the Green Bay Packers.
Collier’s coaching career took him to LSU in 1965, when he joined Charles McClendon’s staff. He stayed there until 1979, when McClendon retired. McClendon, like Collier, was an Arkansan, from Lewisville.
During his LSU tenure, Collier coached first-team All-SEC receivers Andy Hamilton and Gerald Keigley, and six players he worked with were drafted into the NFL. He was also on the staff when the Tigers won the SEC in 1970, giving him a fourth conference championship as part of the program.
Before all of that, Collier had already been a standout multi-sport athlete at Van Buren High School. He played football, basketball and track, set a state pole vault record that lasted for several years, later competed in the event for Arkansas, and also played on the Razorbacks’ freshman basketball team in 1958-59.
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