Along the Way: Farewell to an Arizona football legend

Ouside the locker room there’s always a tunnel or walkway filled with the echoes of grinding cleats and hurrahs from yesteryear, a phantom parade that doesn’t end but goes on, season to season.

Those who pass through the tunnel to the playing field leave a part of themselves and are never forgotten.

Larry Smith will always be a part of the University of Arizona football program.

The big guy with a little boy’s face died Monday at 68, having battled leukemia, then lymphoma and finally, pneumonia.

Survivors include his wife, Cheryl, the most knowledgeable and supportive coach’s wife you will ever meet, and their children, Corby and Alicia.

In 2000, his final year as head football coach at Missouri, Smith was diagnosed with chronic lymphatic leukemia.

From 1980 through the Aloha Bowl of 1986, Smitty was the Arizona head coach. They were the most remarkable seven years in Wildcat football history.

He inherited a program in ruins from NCAA violations, and brought it from darkness into the sunshine of the biggest victories in school history.

Smith’s Wildcats upset No. 1 ranked Southern California at the Los Angeles Coliseum, beat Notre Dame in South Bend and knocked off No. 2 UCLA on a day in which the Bruins were about to vault into the No. 1 spot.

And, dearest to the hearts of Arizona fans, Smitty coached the Cats to five consecutive victories over arch-rival Arizona State, the beginning of nine years without a loss to the Sun Devils.

“He led the life God intended him to lead,” son Corby said. “My dad’s purpose on this Earth was to be a football coach and make a difference in young men’s lives.

“I was fortunate to be his son and just as fortunate to play for him and coach with him.”

Jim Young brought Smith to Tucson with him as defensive coordinator when Young was appointed head coach at UA in 1973. “He was my closest friend in coaching,” Young said. “We were from the same town, Van Wert, Ohio. I’ve known Larry since he was in fifth grade, playing midget-league basketball and I was a freshman in high school, refereeing his games.”

When Young got his first coaching job at Lima Shawnee High School in Ohio, he hired Larry as his assistant. “Then we went to Miami of Ohio together under Bo Schembechler, and when Bo went to Michigan, Larry and I went with him,” Young said.

Smith left Arizona after the 1975 season to become head coach at Tulane. He returned as head coach at UA in 1980, after Tony Mason was fired.

“Larry took four different schools to bowl games and that’s a tremendous accomplishment,” Young said. In his third year at Tulane, Smith took the Green Wave to the Liberty Bowl. He guided Arizona to the 1985 Sun Bowl and 1986 Aloha Bowl.

In six years as head coach at Southern Cal, he won three Pacific-10 Conference championships and took his first four teams to bowl games. He coached Missouri to two bowl games.

Cedric Dempsey became Arizona’s athletic director in 1982 and formed a lasting friendship with the Smith family. “I’ll never forget Larry coming to my house when he took the USC job,” Dempsey said. “Larry broke down, crying. We hugged and he told me, ‘this is my home, Ced.’ He was an emotional guy, and I know he loved Tucson and UA.”

Dempsey and Smith got together for the final time last November when Cedric, a cancer survivor, was here for treatment.

“We had a good talk,” Dempsey said. “Larry was upbeat. He was such a good man and a good friend.”

“You look back at the history of UA football and he was the man who brought the program back to stability,” Dempsey said. “He did a tremendous job in terms of recruiting and coaching. The program had a rebirth under his leadership. Larry loved the university and Tucson just as I do.”

Current Wildcat athletic director Jim Livengood said, “This is a very sad day for Wildcats everywhere. Larry Smith, in addition to an outstanding coaching career, helped those of us in administration. Larry was great having ideas bounced off him and then reacting with his thoughts.

“We will all miss him. He was a great husband, father, educator, coach and friend. This fine man helped make the University of Arizona and the Tucson community better.”

Brian Jeffries, one of the best play-by-play announcers in the country, has been the voice of the Arizona Wildcats since Smith’s first year as head coach at UA.

“Larry was intimately involved in two milestones in my broadcasting career,” Jeffries said. “The first was Sept. 20, 1980, my first game as a member of the UA broadcast crew. I was the young, intrepid sideline reporter. Kent Derdivanis and John Huarte did the play by play.

“Part of my job was to interview Larry in the locker after the game. Well, Colorado State kicked a last-second field goal and beat Arizona in Larry’s UA deabut, 15-13. I remember the locker room was in shock. Nobody expected to lose the game.

“I was equally unprepared. My first question was something like, ‘Well, coach, what happened?’ Instead of making me look like a fool, Larry ignored the question and talked instead about what a close game it was and how disappointed he was that the Wildcats couldn’t win the season opener. Later, Larry and I could joke about that awkward moment.

“The other milestone was was the 1986 Aloha Bowl in Hawaii. Ray Scott didn’t want to make the trip so he asked me to do the play by play. On the day of the game, I went to interview Larry and when we were finished, I got up to leave. Larry asked me to wait a minute. He went over to a duffle bag and pulled out an Aloha Bowl shirt and gave it to me. He said, ‘Thanks for your help.’ We shook hands and only later did I realize it was Larry’s way of saying goodbye. He had accepted the USC job and the Aloha Bowl was his last game at UA.”

Smitty will always be there in the locker room with the Wildcats. He’ll make that short trek to the printed lawn at Arizona Stadium. He’ll be there on the sidelines.

And in the hearts of Arizona fans who loved him.

Corky Simpson is a Green Valley resident and former sports columnist with the Tucson Citizen.