re: Former LSU and S Carolina Coach Paul Dietzel has passed

LINK

A really nice article from the South Carolina perspective.

That smile:

RIP

quote:

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What came to be the LSU look, virtually unchanged since 1955, was his idea.

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very cool

When I was in the lsu tigerband a couple years ago he was a special guest at the stadium. Right before the halftime show we were at attention and about to go onto the field and he looks me right in the eye and says "go get em" then gives me a solid pat on the shoulder. I'll never forget that.

Honestly, that IS a cool story

I actually knew coach well ... just spoke with him by phone earlier this year and we reminisced some things.

A couple of good stories he used to tell all the time. He got to the point where he would tell the same stories over and over, and I knew he was getting close to going home this last time we spoke, but still, he loved telling them.

One was about his stint at Army. (It was a prestigious job at the time.) To make a long story short, when anyone asked him why he left Army to take the SC job he would say, "Because I couldn't beat Navy." And that was true and usually everyone understood so there was no further comment ... and after a bit of silence he would add, "... they just happened to have this guy by the name of Staubach ..." and he would tell great stories about Staubach and having to coach against him and later becoming friends with him.

He was a true class gentleman.

Another was the story about how he and Strom Thurmond got the Williams-Brice money to be used for the stadium upgrades ... and few people knew that Clemson got just as much money from the Williams-Brice endowment as SCAR did.

Anyways ... oh, another time he had called several times and I was out of town but as soon as I got back I returned his call. He answers the phone and we start talking about this reunion he had with his old LSU team from that '59 Championship year and how they honored him ... and then he says, "Oh heck, I gotta go. I forgot to tell you we're having to get out of here until this storm blows over."

The Katrina evacuation had totally slipped his mind. Yet two weeks later he was calling me and we were picking-up right where he left off about the reunion story.

I've got lots more to tell. I called and left a message for Mrs. Anne a little while ago - a stranger answered their home phone and it sounded like a lot of people were there.

He was a great great man. A true gentleman, I cannot say it enough.

Two of my favorites are now gone ... Jim Carlen and Paul Dietzel. I'll miss both of them. Both really good men.

The things about Coach Dietzel, he never had a bad word to say about anyone. Not ever, under any circumstance.

There's one other interesting story Coach used to tell ... about Lou Holtz.

Lou was always fond of saying that Coach Dietzel had fired him when he was an assistant at Carolina (when Lou was an assistant here under Marvin Bass who Coach replaced), but Coach vehemently denied that. There was a good story to go with it but too long to tell here where it would never be appreciated.

I'll look forward to reading Lou's comments about Coach's passing in the next few days. Or perhaps he'll comment about it Thursday night.

A local group did a film about the history of LSU football called the Ole War Skule and obviously the 58 team was a big part of it

The interviewed coach about that team and he said that everytime the players/coach saw each other nowadays he'd look at their hand to make sure they were wearing their NC ring and he said they always had it on. And that it never failed that they'd tell each other that they loved him. He started to cry at that and that always stuck with me. Truly a great guy.

Scrooster, take as much space as you need to tell any old stories you have. Anybody "tl,dr's" it we will all RA for an immediate ban.

This is what these boards should be for. Old stories like this.

Rip coach. Gonna go coach them boys in heaven now.