Dick Tomey

Richard Hastings Tomey (June 20, 1938 – May 10, 2019) was an American football coach and player.

At DePauw, Tomey earned three varsity letters on the DePauw Tigers baseball team at catcher from 1957 to 1959.

Tomey is a 1960 graduate of DePauw University.

He began his college football coaching career as graduate assistant and freshman coach at Miami University under John Pont in 1962, then under Bo Schembechler in 1963.

In 1964, Tomey became freshman coach at Northern Illinois under Howard Fletcher.

From 1965 to 1966, Tomey coached defensive backs at Davidson College under Homer Smith.

He then coached the same position at Kansas from 1967 to 1970 under Pepper Rodgers, then followed Rodgers to UCLA in 1971.

From 1971 to 1973, Tomey was both offensive line and defensive backs coach under Rodgers.

When Dick Vermeil became head coach in 1974, Tomey coached only the defensive backs.

In 1976, new UCLA head coach Terry Donahue promoted Tomey to defensive coordinator.

During Tomey's time as assistant, UCLA won the 1976 Rose Bowl following the 1975 season.

Tomey served as the head football coach at the University of Hawaii at Manoa (1977–1986), University of Arizona (1987–2000), and San Jose State University (2005–2009), compiling a career college football record of 183–145–7.

From 1977 to 1986, Tomey led his teams at Hawaii to their first in season top-20 Associated Press ranking in 1981, and their first AP first-team All-American player, Al Noga.

In 1981, he also earned Western Athletic Conference "Coach of the Year" honors.

In 1987, Tomey became head coach at Arizona, earning Pac-10 "Coach of the Year" honors in 1992.

During his tenure, he coached five future NFL first-round draft choices, 20 All-Americans, and 43 Pac-10 first team players.

His best teams were in the mid-1990s, highlighted by a tenacious "Desert Swarm" defense.

Finally, the Spartans closed out their season with back-to-back wins for the first time since 1997.

He led Arizona to two of four ten-win seasons in school history, highlighted by a 12–1 campaign in 1998, in which they finished fourth in both major polls, the highest ranking in school history.

The Wildcats were drubbed in the 1999 season opener against Penn State and won just six games that year; Tomey resigned after the 2000 season.

Despite a 3–8 record in his inaugural season, the Spartans posted a 3–2 record at home, their first winning record since the 2000 season, although one of these wins came against a Division I-AA team.

Also, the Spartans were the Division I-A leader in improved attendance.

They were one of 11 teams to allow 100 fewer points from the previous year.

In 2003, he was an assistant defensive coach for the San Francisco 49ers specializing in the nickel defense.

In 2004, he helped lead the Texas Longhorns to an 11–1 season and victory in their first-ever Rose Bowl as assistant head coach and defensive ends coach.

In 2005, he became head coach at San Jose State University.

Three of their losses were by only one touchdown and one of those came against the 2005 WAC co-champion, Nevada.

He left as the winningest coach in Hawaii history, but was passed by June Jones during the 2006 season.

This two-game winning streak ended during the 2006 season opener, when they lost to Washington.

In 2006, the Spartans finished their regular season 8–4, and participated in the inaugural New Mexico Bowl against New Mexico.

San Jose State won the game 20–12 on December 23, 2006 and finished with a 9–4 overall record.

In 2009, he was named President of the American Football Coaches Association.

On November 16, 2009, Tomey announced he would be retiring at season's end.

Tomey finished his final season as the Spartans head coach with a 2–10 record in 2009, bringing his head coaching record to 25–35 at San Jose State and 183–145–7 overall in college football.

His last full-time coaching position was as the special teams coach at Hawaii in 2011 under head coach Greg McMackin, who resigned after the season.

Tomey was not retained by McMackin's successor, Norm Chow.

Tomey returned to Hawaii to be special teams coach under Greg McMackin for the 2011 season.

Tomey served as a head coach of the victorious West team in the Casino Del Sol College All-Star Game on January 11, 2013 at Kino Stadium in Arizona.

The school president and athletic director represented Tomey's "nominal resignation was in lieu of termination by the university," but clarified in 2019 after Tomey's death that the threatened termination was a ruse to pass $600,000 to Tomey as a show of gratitude, as he would not be contractually entitled to it if he resigned.

His 95 wins are the most in Wildcats history.