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Lakota West vs. Anderson
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Walker's importance spanned generations
By Pete Conrad, Staff Writer
I've often wondered what it might have been like to try to tackle Randy Walker when he was a running back for Miami University's football team in the mid-1970s, how it might have felt to make violent contact with that short frame, with his head down and shoulders squared, with those amazingly muscular legs churning.
Now, I think I know. The breath would have been slammed out of my lungs. The world would have been turned upside down.
That's what seemed to happen, something very close to a physical body blow, when I learned Friday of Walker's death.
It's impossible for me to think of the man without thinking of his strength, and also of his ability to make the world come alive in unique ways, sometimes when he was in a quiet mood and felt like philosophizing, sometimes during his weekly press conferences at Miami when he would slip into his down-home, aw-shucks style of communication.
I still smile when I think of him telling me the difference — for the first time, or for the 50th time — between a thumb pointer and a finger pointer.
A thumb pointer, Randy said, is a person who accepts responsibility for his own actions. A finger pointer is a person who shifts blame to others. If you played for coach Walker, boy, you'd better be a thumb pointer.
Randy may have appeared to his players at times to be a disciplinarian demon, but that wasn't the real man.
Sometimes after a particularly bad practice, he would chuckle for a few seconds and say, "The hounds just didn't want to hunt." He knew what it was like to be 19 years old.
I remember Randy Walker the player. In the fall of 1974, he was a junior running back at Miami and I was a freshman who would stand in line for an hour in order to gain entrance to old Miami Field on Saturday afternoons.
One Saturday in particular stands clear.
It was Nov. 9, Miami's final home game of the season. The Redskins (as they were known back then) were undefeated, but they needed to beat Kent State in order to win the Mid-American Conference title and clinch a Tangerine Bowl berth.
Miami led for most of the game, but with 59 seconds left in the fourth quarter the Golden Flashes scored a touchdown and took a 17-16 lead.
Miami needed a miracle drive, and for that to happen, a miracle play was required.
Enter Randy Walker.
Miami had two quarterbacks that year. One was Steve Sanna, the passer. The other was Sherman Smith, the runner.
On this particular play, Smith was on the field, which must have mystified the Golden Flashes. They probably were mystified again when Randy, having taken the pitch from Smith, suddenly pulled up.
By the time the light bulb flashed on, it was too late for Kent State. Randy fired a 28-yard pass to Smith, his own quarterback. The Redskins had the ball near midfield and they were in business.
After two more passes (both from Sanna) and three running plays, Miami had the ball at the Kent State 22-yard line with six seconds on the clock. David Draudt kicks a 39-yard field goal to win the game and the MAC championship and a couple thousand Miami students storm the field, myself among them.
That was during Miami's first golden era of football.
From 1973 to '75, Miami won Tangerine Bowls over Florida, Georgia and South Carolina. During that span, their record was 32-1-1 and their final national rankings were, in chronological order, No. 15, No. 10 and No. 12.
And Miami's most important offensive player during that span was Randy Walker. He ran, he caught passes, he threw passes, he blocked, he inspired.
Randy was the star of one golden area, and he primed the pump for another.
Not everyone was happy when Randy was announced as Miami's head coach in December of 1989. And although he managed to turn around a program that had gone 2-18-2 the previous two seasons, the grumbling continued as Randy's overall record after five seasons in Oxford was only three games above .500.
But then, suddenly, the patience paid off.
Miami scored an amazing 30-28 comeback victory at Northwestern in 1995, the RedHawks stunned Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va. in 1997 and finished the season 8-3, and in 1998 Randy's team opened with a 13-10 upset at North Carolina and — with the help of players like Travis Prentice, Mike Bath, Dustin Cohen and JoJuan Armour — finished 10-1.
The RedHawks never won a MAC championship or played in a bowl game under Randy. But thanks to his absolute belief in his school, his players and in himself, they did return to championship form.
And they've been there ever since.
Contact this reporter at (513) 820-2197 or pconrad@coxohio.com.
