Longhorn Great, Coach Fred Akers passes away

Was my 3rd year at UT when they fired Akers. I wasn't aware of UT history in those early years. The news just kept repeating "1st Texas losing season in 30 years". 2nd winningest coach at Texas at that time. Couldn't understand it. Then McWilliams has 3 losing seasons in 5 years....couldn't understand that either.

From what I'm reading on this board, unlucky to never have met him.

Hook 'em.
 
I was critical near the end of his tenure, which I have since regretted for years. Akers was a class act who succeeded in a political environment that was basically out to get him.

While perhaps he would have turned down the offers, on many occasions after he retired I hoped that the current HC would consider bringing him in to coach the defense.

RIP. He was greatly under appreciated.
 
Indeed, a "lesser man" would have been bitter. I was at the Annual Football Awards Banquet every year from 1974 through 1985. At each of those Banquets was a Who's Who, and those who thought that they were a Who's Who of Texas Athletics. That's a heck of a roster if you think about it.

At none of those Banquets, with all of those, oh so very important people, was Fred Akers the "lesser man". Perhaps in the end, it was his sense of right and wrong and his essential dignity that made him such a target of those that truly were "lesser men".

RIP Coach. I still have the note you sent me when you beat Indiana after you went to Purdue, framed behind my desk. Your suffering is over, you and Danny can watch over Diane.

:hookem2::texasflag:
 
Fred's first job was working for Buckshot Underwood at Port Arthur. Then he went back and recruited some 5-8 kids off that Port Arthur team that Todd was the QB on. We disagreed on a couple of them, but they all contributed, unlike a particular one that DKR signed when Fred was an assistant at TJ.
 
Joe Fan said:
With Randy McEachern at the 1977 ou game
You can probably see me in the background
We won 13-7, went undefeated in the regular season, Earl won the Heisman
DuPS74uU8AALSxc
Click to expand...
Wasn't it 13-6? RIP Coach!!!
 
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everette said:
Wasn't it 13-6? RIP Coach!!!
Click to expand...

I was perhaps in an altered state that day, so anything is possible
But I do remember Earl threw a pass and was intercepted
McBath and Aune
Erxleben's kick and punts were unreal
 
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He told Switzer right after the OU rain game, that’d we’d go out for a 5th quarter.
RIP-!!!!! You got Earl his Heisman.
 
Had the privilege of meeting him once when he spoke at a business meeting in Fort Worth as the guest speaker. He was very gracious and spoke well. He certainly was a gentleman in every respect. RIP, Coach. :hookem:
 
A better coach than he will ever get credit for and great man. It's sad to get up and read about this.

When I think about Fred I always think about Danny too because I had a class with him. A small public speaking class so everyone got to know everyone. He always had about 5 hot sorority girls following him around and I guess I resented him for that. My first thought was always it must be nice to be the coaches son.

Then I read about his early passing of cancer and it kinda made me sick to my stomach. You will be missed Fred! HookEm':bevo:
 
Very saddened by his passing at 82.

As many of you stated Fred was a gentleman, always classy - a good man. Clearly a good representative of what the HC should be at UT.

I had the pleasure of meeting Coach Akers at a Texas-Ex function in Dallas about 1980 - 81 when he spoke to the group.

What I remember: he was very friendly and gracious toward everyone. He talked to me for 5-10 minutes about UT football like we were genuinely old friends - not me as some random fan / stranger (that I was). I was struck by that.

A friend snapped a photo of us shaking hands that I will post later if I can find it.

RIP Coach - you were one of our best :hookem:
 
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More photos:



vvvv

Coach Akers greets Joe Paterno after the Horns beat State Penn in the Meadowlands 1984 - score was 28-3 !



Coaching QB Todd Dodge:



More recent photo:

 
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nice video tribute for Coach Akers.........




notice they had no trouble singing the Eyes at the end...............forgive me Dion!
 
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After getting an undergrad degree from another school in 1979, I took a job in Blytheville, AR for four days in August of that year. I drove by a house with a big sign in the front yard that said it was either the birthplace or the childhood home (don't remember exactly) of University of Texas head coach Fred Akers. After I found out in a few days that I wasn't ready for this job, I headed to Austin for the fall semester and got to see Coach Akers work for the next several years.

Rest in peace, Coach.
 
We used to give the defense standing ovations for the three-and-outs. Lots and lots of them. Loved his teams and sorry I never met him
 
Coach Akers was also the coach at my first UT game, @A&M '83 for the 11th win of the season. I was a HS senior in the aggie student section with my girlfriend, and her younger sister. My girlfriend's dad got us the tickets through is aggie friend, and they were on the opposite side of the stadium. It was rough falling behind 13-0, but we turned around the BEVO score and the aggies didn't score again 13-45 UT. My girlfriend was going to UT the following fall, as I went away on soccer scholarship, and wouldn't enroll until '88. It was also weird to see Jeff Ward on the UT team, when I had just played him in the first UIL soccer final 4 the previous Spring. I scored the tying goal 1-1 in the second half, but he scored West Lake's winner in the dying seconds of the game.
RIP Coach Akers :hookem:
 
Texas Monthly article by Richard Justice
Fred Akers, 1938–2020: A Remembrance

" .... Akers, however, didn’t try to emulate his predecessor’s charm. In ten seasons at Texas, Akers appears never to have uttered a memorable or controversial quote. His former defensive coordinator, Phil Bennett, told the Austin American-Statesman that Akers “was absolutely one of the finest and most balanced human beings I’ve ever been around, besides being a Hall of Fame coach.” Once, when Southern Methodist University coach Ron Meyer lost his place during a speech and quipped, “Excuse me a Fred Akers moment,” we reporters ran to Akers for reaction and got nothing. Well, we got one thing: Texas 30, SMU 6.

Months later, when someone brought up Meyer’s quote, Akers may have smiled. Years later I asked him about that game, and he still wouldn’t bite. He may have smiled at the memory, but maybe that’s just how I choose to remember it.

His strength was not in Xs and Os, although he was plenty good at both. His strength was not in hiring good coaches, although he did a good job there too. More than anything else, Akers understood how to build a winning culture. He did that with a singular, steely, and unwavering focus: all that mattered was winning that day, that week, that game. “He was one of those guys who, over the years, you realize that part of your lifestyle is based on things you learned from him,” Doug Dawson, an All-America offensive lineman, told the Houston Chronicle. “I call it ‘delusional optimism’—the ability to visualize success at every level.”

Donnie Little, who became the first Black quarterback to start for the Longhorns, told the Chronicle: “You could feel his honesty when he was sitting [in] our living room with my parents. He was preaching how he wanted to make change and make history at UT, and he was a man of his word.”

One Friday afternoon before a game against Rice, I sat in Akers’s office and began asking questions about the following week’s game against Oklahoma. These questions did not anger him. He simply could not comprehend thinking about Oklahoma when he was only thinking about Rice. I pestered for a bit, promised not to use any of the quotes until the following week, did everything I could to persuade the coach to look past lowly Rice and ahead to the next week’s opponent. He wouldn’t do it. Akers believed that if he allowed his focus to veer from Rice for even a second, his players might pick up on it.

Finally, grudgingly, he walked over to a photograph of the Longhorns coming down the tunnel for an OU game and pointed. “Look at their eyes,” he said. “Tells you everything.” In the photograph, the players’ eyes—open wide, nervous, thrilled—made it clear that the Longhorns needed no extra motivation against the Sooners...."​

This is the referenced picture
The sig on the rt is Terry Tausch who passed this past March
#28 is Bobby Johnson
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