I’ll always regret NU losing one of my favorite coaches, Alex Agase to Purdue. Alex was an Evanston native who coached NU for when I was a freshman in 1971. He left NU for Purdue when then NU prez Strotz deemphasized fully supporting NU sports, with rumors at the time fomenting NU was considering leaving the BIgTen. John Pont came to NU which was the start of the “Dark Ages”.
For those not familiar with Alex’s role at NU here is a link to his bio. NU football alum/ sportswriter Rick Telander played under Alex and has also written about him.
en.wikipedia.org
I knew that Agase was a great coach but, much like one of my sports & childhood heroes (Dante Lavelli) he was a WW2 veteran and played for the Browns as well.
Thank you for sharing! Can’t get this kind of amazing free public history on The Rock
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Agase grew up in Illinois and attended the
University of Illinois, where he was a standout as a
guard starting in 1941. He was named an All-American in 1942. Agase then entered the
U.S. Marines during World War II and played a season at Purdue while in training. He was again named an All-American in 1943. After his discharge from the Marines, he came back to Illinois and played a final season in 1946, after which he was named an All-American for a third time. Agase began his professional football career with the
Los Angeles Dons of the
All-America Football Conference (AAFC) in 1947, but was soon traded to the
Chicago Rockets and then the Browns, where he remained until 1952. Cleveland won two AAFC championships and one
National Football League championship while Agase was on the team. After retiring from football, Agase worked as an assistant coach for the
Dallas Texans and, after a brief return to playing for the
Baltimore Colts,
Iowa State University. He was hired as an assistant at Northwestern in 1956 under head coach
Ara Parseghian.
dailynorthwestern.com
