thirty minutes ahead of you or thirty minutes behind." Team manager Hill Brannon remembered one of Woodruff's many Yogi Berra-esque pre-game exhortations as "Remember, the team that makes the fewest mistakes, makes the fewest mistakes." In a moment of self-deprecating humor, Woodruff once described himself as "the oratorical equivalent of a blocked punt." Woodruff also developed a reputation for identifying and fostering talented young assistant coaches. His Gators assistants included Frank Broyles, future head football coach of the Arkansas Razorbacks; Hank Foldberg, future head coach of the Texas A&M Aggies; Dale Hall, future head coach of the Army Black Knights; John Sauer, future head coach of The Citadel Bulldogs; John Rauch, future head coach of the Buffalo Bills and Oakland Raiders; and Tonto Coleman, former head coach of the Abilene Christian Wildcats and future commissioner of the Southeastern Conference. His Gators players included Doug Dickey, the future head coach of the Tennessee Volunteers and Florida Gators. In the competitive SEC of the 1950s, Woodruff's Gators would not win more than six games again in a season, but they were ranked in the top twenty teams of the final AP Poll in each of 1957, 1958 and 1959. Woodruff coached the Florida Gators football team for ten seasons from 1950 through 1959, finishing with a 53–42–6 record. During his tenure, Woodruff's Gators scored notable upsets, suffered close losses, received their first two NCAA-sanctioned bowl game invitations and their first four final AP poll rankings, but Woodruff's greatest legacy in Gainesville may have been rebuilding the Gators into a team that was consistently competitive against the other major football programs of the SEC, and thereby laying the groundwork for the future successes of Ray Graves' 1960s Florida Gators teams that followed. Woodruff was inducted into the University of Florida Athletic Hall of Fame as an "honorary letter winner" in 1983. Athletic director During his time as the Gators football coach, Woodruff also worked as Florida's athletic director. From 1963 to 1985, Woodruff served as the athletic director at his alma mater, the University of Tennessee. As Tennessee athletic director, Woodruff oversaw the rise of the Volunteers' athletic program as a nationally recognized power and was responsible for the renovation, expansion and construction of the university's state-of-the-art athletic facilities. Between 1963 and 1985, the Volunteers won national championships in cross country, swimming and diving, and track and field, and participated in fifteen football