EDITOR'S NOTE -- On Saturday, former Ohio State quarterback Rex Kern and 15 others -- including Doug Flutie, Ahmad Rashad and Chris Zorich -- will be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, Ind. This story, written by Bucknuts contributor Heath Schneider, was originally published in the December 2007 edition of Bucknuts The Magazine. (Former OSU coach John Cooper has been selected for induction in the 2009 Hall of Fame class.) When former Ohio State quarterback Rex Kern gets inducted into the National Football Foundation’s College Football Hall of Fame in December, he finishes a football odyssey that began over 40 years ago when he arrived on campus in Columbus for the first time.
Strangely enough for this football hero and All-American, he hadn’t even planned on playing football at Ohio State. Instead, he dreamt of playing basketball for legendary coach Fred Taylor and the Buckeyes.
“It was really interesting,” Kern said. “Fred Taylor, our basketball coach at Ohio State, starting recruiting me at least a year or more before Coach (Woody) Hayes did and before Woody started to get into the mix of things. I had grown up as a wonderful basketball fan of Coach Taylor’s.
“And of course in 1960, that wonderful super sophomore group won the national championship with (Jerry) Lucas, (John) Havlicek and (Larry) Siegfried, and that was really so exciting for me that I wanted at that time to go to Ohio State and play basketball. So it was a real thrill for me to have Coach Taylor recruit me to come to Ohio State to play basketball.”
But something funny happened on the way to St John Arena and life on the hardwood floors. Hayes realized that Kern, a multi-sport star at nearby Lancaster (Ohio) High School, was as much a football talent as a basketball talent and set his sights on having Kern give a commitment to play football instead.
“Then Woody got involved,” said Kern, who now lives in California. “Really, the important thing to me was the emphasis that both Woody and Fred put on getting a degree and graduating from Ohio State. They really were the only two coaches that spent that amount of time talking about education.
“They spent more time talking about education versus coming and playing football or basketball. They believed in getting an education and they believed in the student-athlete and that really impressed me. And it made a big impression upon my family as well.”
Once Hayes stole Kern away from Taylor, the quarterback became the centerpiece of the talented class of recruits referred to as the “Super Sophomores.” College football rules were different at that time and freshmen were not allowed to play in games. So Kern -- along with All-Americans such as running back John Brockington, Jan White, and hard hitting defensive back Jack Tatum and Lombardi Trophy winner Jim Stillwagon -- played on the scout team as freshmen.
Both Tatum and Stillwagon have already been inducted into the hall of fame and the greatness of that class is not lost on Kern. Like a true team captain, Kern spent a lot of time talking about his teammates instead of himself.
“You would not believe the level of football talent that we had in that class,” Kern said. “It was incredible to me. You talk about Brock, you talk about Tate, you talk about Wagon and you can go right down the line. I believe that we had in that class 11 high school All-Americans. That was the first year that Woody and his coaching staff went outside the state of Ohio to really recruit non-Ohio football players.
“And he got guys like John Brockington, who was an All-American and a first-round draft choice in the NFL. Jack Tatum was a two-time All-American, the UPI player of the year and a first-round draft choice. We had Jan White, who was an All-American. He was the first pick in the second round by the Buffalo Bills. We had Bruce Jankowski, who was our great wide receiver. Timmy Anderson, who was an All-American and a first-round draft choice by the 49ers. You just go right down the list and that was the kind of talent that we had on our football team.
“It was just a joy and a delight to see what those guys were going to do on the next play or how they were going to break a tackle or run over a person. It was incredible to see the amount of talent on that team. And the lead up was Woody had tapped us as the greatest recruiting class that he’d ever had at Ohio State University. And so he built up a lot of fanfare for our class coming in and for us to live up to that hype was quite a challenge. But I really believe the hype was not as not as good as we ended up being.”
And Kern, who threw for 2,444 yards in his career at Ohio State, might be right about that. He helped lead the Buckeyes to the national championship in 1968. That season culminated with OSU’s 50-14 win over Michigan in Ohio Stadium and a 27-16 win in the Rose Bowl over No. 2 USC, which was led by Heisman Trophy winner O.J. Simpson.
The Buckeyes came back the following year and extended their winning streak to a school-record 22 straight games before falling at Michigan 24-12. Accordingly, OSU narrowly missed the national title in 1969 before gaining a piece of the crown again in 1970.
The honors stacked up on the individual levels from those championship teams as well with 11 All-Americans, 22 All-Big Ten selections, a Lombardi Award and an Outland Trophy and three players that placed in the top 10 in Heisman balloting, with Kern himself reaching the highest with a third-place finish in 1969. He was voted an OSU team captain in 1970.
“In three years, we only lost two football games,” Kern detailed. “We did win one unanimous national championship. We won two outright Big Ten championships. We won a co-Big Ten championship. We won a co-national championship in 1970. If it had not been those two games, we would have been the first and the only team in college football to win three straight unanimous national championships.”
Kern’s induction into the College Football Hall of Fame comes nearly four decades after he starred at OSU and three decades after he was inducted into OSU’s Athletic Hall of Fame. He was part of the 1978 class, which was just the second year of the OSU Hall of Fame.
Of course, Kern was in Columbus at the start of “The Ten Year War” between Hayes and his former protégé turned nemesis, Bo Schembechler, who left the tutelage of Hayes at Ohio State to become the head coach at Michigan. Hayes finished 4-5-1 against Schembechler, but Kern’s teams posted a healthy 2-1 record against Michigan.
“Anything to get those guys up north was always the big thing,” Kern said. “Woody would never, ever mouth the word of that state up north until maybe the week of the game. Woody always prepared us. I guess the best thing is that Woody lived and built his career against competing against those guys up north.
“The thing that makes that rivalry the greatest rivalry in college football is that we both have great universities. We have great coaching staffs. We have respect for one another. And we always know that they’re going to play a great football game against us and they’re going to be ready. Woody would always prepare us for that. For him not to mention that name until that week, it held special memories and whenever you thought about that week or those guys up there.”
After graduating from Ohio State, the NFL was next for Kern, where he was a first-round draft pick. But he wasn’t drafted to be the quarterback for a pro team. Rather, he was selected as a defensive back. That meant that Kern would have to learn not just a new position, but move to the other side of the ball to compete in the NFL.
“It was a fun change for me,” Kern said. “When I was drafted by the Baltimore Colts they said, ‘Rex, we’ve still got a guy by the name of Johnny Unitas that can play and his backup is Earl Morrall. We drafted you to be a defensive back for us.’
“That was fine with me. I was just happy to go to the NFL. It was very gratifying to go to a team that had won the Super Bowl the year before. My rookie year, I had the opportunity to earn a starting position, but not where they drafted me. They drafted me as a safety but I ended up being a starter at the right corner. Really, being in Baltimore was the perfect situation for me.”
Following his career in the NFL, Kern worked with the Ohio State athletic department. But he was lured out to the West Coast to work with Nautilus, makers of the fitness machines by the same name. He returned to Pasadena, where he had met his wife, Nancy, years prior at the 1969 Rose Bowl, where she was a Rose Bowl princess.
Following the death of Hayes in 1987, Kern worked with his teammates to establish the Ann and Woody Hayes Endowment. Using some of his inherent leadership skills, he was able to coordinate donations from many of the players that worked for and learned under Hayes.
“It was when Woody passed away,” Kern said. “It was interesting. On the way home from the memorial service that we had for Woody at Ohio State, I starting thinking about what we could do to honor Woody. The thing that kept coming back to me was education and scholarships.
“Woody always talked to us about paying forward and we can never pay back those people who have helped us. We can always pay forward to those folks that need our help in the future. So, I wrote a letter to all of our teammates from the national championship and asked them if they would be willing to honor Woody and donating money to set up the scholarship fund in Woody and Ann’s honor.
“The response was overwhelming. We put together a program where we were able to raise $1.3 million in honor of Woody and Ann, just from our national championship team. That was quite a statement and quite a tribute to Woody.”
Moving ahead to more recent times, Kern developed a relationship with Craig Krenzel, who was the quarterback of the 2002 national championship team for Ohio State; the first national title for the Buckeyes since Kern’s 1970 team. In what amounted to a passing of the torch from one generation to the next, Kern provided tutelage and words of wisdom to Krenzel during that unprecedented 14-0 run in 2002. A modest Kern downplayed his role.
“Before the 2002 season, I had the opportunity to meet the players,” Kern said. “I had the opportunity to share a little bit of time with Craig and then the media drew the parallel between Craig and I. They continued on that theme so I tried to communicate with Craig often and encourage him, but really it was the team.
“But I got to know Craig and his wife and Craig’s family and there was an almost immediate bond because Craig is now the last quarterback for the national championship teams at Ohio State.”
Getting into the Hall of Fame isn’t an easy task. There have been roughly 4.7 million college football players over the decades and there are approximately 800 that have been immortalized and sent to the Hall. To be eligible, a player has to have been selected as a major first-team All-American, be at least 10 years removed from college, be retired from professional football and “proven himself worthy as a citizen after his football career.”
“It came completely as a surprise,” said Kern, currently affiliated with United Midwest Savings Bank. “I was completely overcome with emotion when I was notified. It was completely a surprise to me. I was on my way out the door to go to physical therapy.
“It was a box that had an engraved football on it from the Hall of Fame. I opened this thing up and I saw it as a football. You know, I get footballs from time to time to sign and I didn’t quite recognize it and understand it. Then I saw there was a little letter attached to it and the letter explained it. And that’s how I came to find out.”
Kern was recognized at Ohio State at halftime of the Oct. 20 home game with Michigan State.
As he heads into the Hall of Fame, Kern remains humbled by the honor and is quick to tell anyone who will listen that there are more from his teams that deserve to be enshrined as well.
“From my perspective, I would charter a jumbo jet and take every player I played with at Ohio State,” said Kern, who holds a doctorate degree from Ohio State. “They’re all deserving of being in the Hall of Fame. There are so many players from those three teams that should be there that trying to single out one or two or three or four doesn’t do justice for the talent I played with.
“It was just one of those things that God had prepared, that descended on Columbus in 1967. It feels overwhelming and it makes me reflect back to the success that we had and I wouldn’t be going into the Hall of Fame if it wasn’t for all of my teammates and coaches. I think it’s a wonderful reflection for Ohio State University and our football program.”
Buckeyes In The College Football Hall Of Fame Players Position Years at OSU Inducted
Chic Harley HB 1916-17, ’19 1951
Gaylord Stinchcomb HB 1917-20 1973Wes Fesler E 1928-30 1954Gomer Jones C 1934-35 1978 Gust Zarnas G 1935-37 1975Bill Willis T 1942-44 1971Les Horvath QB 1940-42, ’44 1969Warren Amling G-T 1944-46 1984Jim Daniell T 1939-41 1977Vic Janowicz HB 1949-51 1976Howard Cassady HB 1952-55 1979Jim Parker G 1954-56 1974Aurealius Thomas G 1955-57 1989Archie Griffin TB 1972-75 1986Jim Stillwagon MG 1968-70 1991Bob Ferguson FB 1959-61 1996Randy Gradishar LB 1971-73 1998John Hicks OT 1970, 72-73 2001Jack Tatum DB 1968-70 2004Jim Houston E 1957-58 2005Rex Kern QB 1968-70 2007
Coaches Pos. Years at OSU Inducted
Howard Jones Head Coach 1910 1951
John Wilce Head Coach 1913-28 1954Francis Schmidt Head Coach 1934-40 1971Ernie Godfrey Assistant Coach 1929-61 1972Woody Hayes Head Coach 1951-78 1983Sid Gillman Assistant Coach 1941 1989Doyt Perry Assistant Coach 1951-54 1988Earle Bruce Head Coach 1979-87 2002John Cooper Head Coach 1988-2000 2009
