Blue White Illustrated

The Daily Collegian and had become a casual friend of both Radakovich and Moore. They were both great sources about the football team, on and off the record. And while researching for this BWI column on Moore, I stumbled on a column I wrote as sports editor for the Sept. 12, 1958, edition of the Collegian with the headline: "Ex-Lions Coach Frosh Gridders." Upon seeing the head- line for the first time in decades, it all came back to me, and especially the friendliness of my relationship with Joe and Rad. "A couple of ex-Penn State football stalwarts, Dan Radakovich and Joe Moore, are helping freshman coach Earl Bruce with the Lion yearlings this fall," I wrote, and then went on to quote Radakovich about the outlook for the 1958 varsity. After graduating in May 1959, I went off to the Navy and then a career in journalism. I have no memory of what happened to Joe over many of the years. I remember seeing Rad a few times in Pittsburgh in the 1960s but then did not reconnect with him until about a dozen years ago. It was not until helping Rad write his autobiography that I learned how close he and Joe had been since our undergraduate days. Joe is mentioned frequently in Rad's book, and Rad's in- cisive and often witty tales of their blood-brothers relationship are crucial to understanding the impulsive person- alities and career successes of both men. You can trace Joe's notable career through their kinship, starting at Rich- field Springs High School in Cooper- stown, N.Y., in the fall of 1959 and end- ing in a surprising high-profile firing at Notre Dame in December 1996 and sub- sequently a winning lawsuit for age dis- crimination in 1998. In two years, Moore turned a losing program at Richfield into a state cham- pion. He moved on to Tonawanda (N.Y.) High School for two years, then to Erie McDowell for nine years. McDowell quickly became a major challenger in the rugged WPIAL Class AA division, then the highest classification, with a 65-15-1 record during his tenure, including 41-4 in his last four years. In 1972 Moore took over at Upper St. Clair in suburban Pittsburgh and transformed the school into a powerhouse, going undefeated in his last 26 games while winning back- to-back WPIAL Class AA champi- onships in 1974-75. In his 17 years as a scholastic coach, Moore lost just 32 games, won 119 and tied four. An incident while coaching at Mc- Dowell in 1965 tells you all you need to know about Joe's personality and coaching style. As described in the New Castle News, in a 16-13 loss to Erie East in mid-October, "Moore became infu- riated when East scored its winning touchdown on a play in which he felt a penalty should have been called." Moore proceeded to belt the referee, sending him to the hospital for X-rays on his jaw. "I thought you were a tough guy and he didn't even fall to the ground," Moore's wife, Fran, told him, as Radakovich recalled with laugh. A few days later, the PIAA suspended Moore for the rest of the season. Herein are another two examples of the small world we live in. At McDowell, Moore gave a young Slippery Rock play- er his first assistant coaching job. A few years later, Denny Douds, a childhood friend of mine from Indiana, became the head coach at Shippensburg and the mentor of Penn State's head coach, James Franklin. Then there's Kirk Fer- entz, the head coach at Iowa since 1999. Ferentz was a senior linebacker for Moore in his first season at Upper St. Clair. Eight years later, Moore brought Ferentz to Pitt as a graduate assistant to help him coach the offensive line, and the next year, with recommendations from Moore and Radakovich, Ferentz became the offensive line coach at Iowa. "If Joe came into your life, he really touched it," Ferentz told the Chicago Tribune 12 years ago. "He was the best man I ever met." What is somewhat surprising is that Moore was not considered an offensive line specialist when Pitt's Jackie Sherrill hired him in 1977. His expertise was in coaching running backs, and that's what Sherrill hired him to do. However, in the winter of 1980 Pitt was looking for an offensive line coach, and Moore told his friend Radakovich. By then, Rad was coaching the Los Angeles Rams' offen- sive line after previously serving in the same capacity on the Pittsburgh Steel- ers' 1974 Super Bowl championship team. "They had three offensive line coaches in three years, and one had only lasted a couple of weeks of spring practice," Radakovich wrote in his book. "I said to Joe, 'Why don't you take the offensive line job yourself. You're always moaning about them, anyway. I'll help you get started.'… Joe told [Sherrill] he wanted the job, got it, and I flew in from Califor- nia a couple of weeks before spring practice started at Pitt [to help him]." Joe was an instant success, as his pro- tégés Grimm and Covert have said. In 1984, Sports Illustrated touted Moore as "the best line coach in college football." However, by then Pitt had drifted into mediocrity. Sherrill had given Moore additional responsibilities as offensive coordinator, but the head coach left for Texas A&M following the 1981 season. The next year, Sherrill's successor, Foge Fazio, the former assistant head coach and defensive coordinator, added assis- tant head coach to Moore's duties. After reaching the postseason in 1982 and '83, Fazio's Panthers fell to 3-7 in '84, and Moore lost his two extra titles. One year later, after guiding the team to a 5-5-1 finish, all the coaches lost their jobs. Moore moved on to Temple, where he coached in 1986 and '87. Then in Feb- ruary 1988, Lou Holtz hired him to coach the Notre Dame tight ends and offensive tackles, and that team gave Moore his only national championship ring. The next season, he was in charge of the en- tire offensive line again, and after the 1993 season he was awarded an hon- orary monogram from the Notre Dame National Monogram Club. Aaron Taylor and Andy Heck were among the All-Americans and NFL players Moore produced at Notre Dame, and Taylor, the 1993 Lombardi Award

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