Tommy Prothro

James Thompson Prothro Jr. was an American football coach and player. He was the head coach at Oregon State University from 1955 to 1964 and the University of California, Los Angeles from 1965 to 1970, compiling a career college football record of 104–55–5.
Prothro moved to the professional ranks of the National Football League in as head coach of the Los Angeles Rams, a position he held for two seasons. He then coached the San Diego Chargers from 1974 to 1978, tallying a career NFL mark of 35–51–2. Prothro was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1991.

Early life and playing career

Prothro, a native of Memphis, Tennessee, was the son of Major League Baseball player and manager Doc Prothro, who played for three teams between 1920 and 1926, then managed the Philadelphia Phillies from 1939 to 1941 before buying the minor league Memphis Chicks. His uncle, Clifton B. Cates, was commandant of the United States Marine Corps from 1948 to 1952.
The younger Prothro found his niche in football, starting out as a quarterback for Wallace Wade's Duke Blue Devils. In 1941, Prothro's versatility on the field helped him win the Jacobs award as the best blocker in the Southern Conference as the Blue Devils reached the 1942 Rose Bowl. During his time at the school, Prothro also competed in baseball and lacrosse, and graduated from the school in 1942 with a degree in political science.
Prothro was selected in the fifth round of the 1942 NFL draft by the New York Giants, but rejected the opportunity in favor of a budding coaching career and a brief attempt at professional baseball.

Assistant coaching career and military service

Prothro spent that fall as an assistant coach at Western Kentucky University. He then entered the U.S. Navy during World War II, serving for 39 months. Prothro was promoted to lieutenant and served as a gunnery officer aboard the , an escort aircraft carrier.
After the war, Prothro served from 1946 to 1948 as an assistant coach at Vanderbilt University, under head coach Red Sanders, coaching the freshmen during his first year. When Sanders became head coach at UCLA, he brought Prothro with him. Over the next six years, Prothro used the single-wing formation as UCLA's backfield coach, helping the Bruins to an undefeated season and national championship in 1954.

College head coaching career

Oregon State

That success translated into his hiring as head coach at Oregon State College on February 1, 1955. The Beavers had won just one of nine games the previous season, but improved to six wins in Prothro's first season, then reached the 1957 Rose Bowl. In 1962, the Beavers won a 6–0 decision over Villanova University in the Liberty Bowl; they were led by quarterback Terry Baker, who won the Heisman Trophy. Baker's 99-yard run from scrimmage was the only score in the game and remains an NCAA record. In 1964, Oregon State were admitted into the AAWU and tied for first place with USC. Due to their recent entry into that conference with schedules set years in advance, the Beavers and Trojans did not meet in 1964. Although Oregon State was assured of a better overall record than USC, the AAWU announced it would delay its decision regarding the Rose Bowl berth until after USC's final game vs. undefeated and top-ranked Notre Dame. This made USC fans infer that, if the Trojans had a strong showing against heavily favored Notre Dame, they might somehow get the Rose Bowl berth despite Oregon State's better record. USC upset Notre Dame, 20–17, and USC fans were outraged when Oregon State was awarded the Rose Bowl anyway. This would be a factor two years later. In the 1965 Rose Bowl, the Beavers went ahead 7–0 in the second quarter, but went on lose big to Michigan 34–7. Ten days later, Prothro left Oregon State to replace Bill Barnes at UCLA. Prothro compiled a 63–37–2 mark in his decade at Oregon State, with only one losing season. He was replaced by Dee Andros, the head coach at Idaho, whose Vandals had played Oregon State tough in 1964 in Corvallis, defeated 10–7 by a late third quarter OSU punt return. The previous year, he led Idaho to its first winning season in a quarter century.

UCLA

1965

On January 11, 1965, he was hired as head coach at UCLA to replace William F. Barnes. In the 1965 football season, the Bruins lost their season opening game 13–3 at Michigan State, who then rose to become the top-ranked team in the country. The unheralded Bruins would go on a seven-game undefeated streak, surprising national powers like Syracuse and Penn State. Going into the 1965 UCLA–USC rivalry football game ranked #7, the conference championship and 1966 Rose Bowl were on the line. #6 USC, led by Heisman Trophy winner Mike Garrett led 16–6 until UCLA got a touchdown on a pass from Gary Beban to Dick Witcher with four minutes to play. After the two-point conversion made it 16–14, UCLA recovered an onside kick. Beban then hit Kurt Altenberg on a 50-yard bomb and UCLA won, 20–16. Integrated UCLA then faced all-white Tennessee in the newly built Liberty Bowl stadium in Memphis, Prothro's native city. On the last play of the game, Tennessee defensive back Bob Petrella intercepted a UCLA pass to save a Volunteer win by a score of 37–34. Tennessee's winning drive was aided by a controversial pass interference call, the clock had questionably stopped twice, and a dropped pass that appeared to be a lateral was recovered by UCLA but was later ruled an incomplete forward pass. After the game, Prothro stated, "For the first time in my life, I am ashamed to be a Southerner."
The Bruins went to the 1966 Rose Bowl as a 14½ point underdog in a rematch with undefeated and #1 ranked powerhouse Michigan State. UCLA, now dubbed "The Miracle Bruins" by Sports Illustrated, vanquished the heavily favored Spartans 14–12. That victory gave UCLA an 8–2–1 mark, prevented the Spartans from winning the AP title, and resulted in Prothro earning Coach of the Year accolades from his coaching colleagues. UCLA finished #4 that season, and due to their small size, earned the enduring moniker, "Gutty little Bruins."

1966

Heading into the final game of the 1966 season vs. USC, UCLA was 2–1 in conference games, 8–1 overall and ranked #5 in the country. The Bruins, featuring a "dream backfield" of All-Americans Gary Beban and Mel Farr, lost only one game, at rainy Washington, 16–3, where Huskies' head coach Jim Owens had devoted his entire season to beating Prothro. UCLA had beaten UW the season before, 28–24, with Prothro's trick play, the Z-streak in which a receiver trots towards the sideline like he's going out of the game and then runs a streak pattern unguarded by the inattentive defender. USC was 4–0 in conference and 7–1 overall, having lost to the unranked Miami Hurricanes. The Bruins and Trojans played a different number of conference games due to uneven scheduling caused by new AAWU members Oregon and Oregon State and schedules made years in advance. It was widely assumed that only losses would be considered and the winner of the 1966 UCLA-USC game would go to the 1967 Rose Bowl. UCLA star quarterback Gary Beban broke his ankle the week before in a win over Stanford, but backup Norman Dow, making his first and only start at quarterback, led UCLA to a 14–7 win. That left USC with a 4–1 conference record and #5 UCLA with a 3–1 conference record overall. Due to their win over USC, it was widely assumed UCLA would get the Rose Bowl berth. However, a vote the next Monday among the AAWU conference athletic directors awarded USC the Rose Bowl berth. It was speculated that the directors believed Beban could not play for UCLA in the Rose Bowl due to the broken ankle, thereby giving the Big Ten Conference representative, Purdue, a better chance to win. As it turned out, Beban could have played. But a bigger reason was that this was to make up for 1964 when Oregon State was voted in ahead of USC. The coach of Oregon State in 1964 was Prothro. Another speculation was the vote was against UCLA out of pure jealousy by the rest of the conference, which voted 7–1 for the clearly inferior team. This vote deprived Prothro of being the first coach to earn three consecutive Rose Bowl berths and UCLA athletic director J. D. Morgan called it a "gross injustice" and the "a dark day in UCLA and AAWU Athletic history." Inflamed UCLA students who had gathered for the Rose Bowl celebration rally, took to the streets of Westwood in protest and actually blocked the 405 Freeway for a short time. Ironically, Morgan was the force behind establishing a tie-breaking method adopted by the conference one year later in which only loss column counted; the first tiebreaker was head-to-head results, followed by overall record. If there was still a tie, the Rose Bowl berth would go to the team that had not played in the Rose Bowl the longest. But it was too late for UCLA. In their final game, USC made the AAWU decision look bad by losing at home in the L.A. Coliseum to Notre Dame, 51–0. They went on to lose the Rose Bowl as well to Purdue, 14–13, finishing the season at 7–4.

1967

Two years later, Prothro helped a second quarterback capture the Heisman Trophy when Gary Beban was awarded the trophy after the regular season. He would bring his #1 ranked UCLA Bruin team to face #2 USC in one of the "Games of the Century". Despite playing with cracked ribs, Beban threw for 301 yards, but UCLA lost, 21–20, on a spectacular 64-yard run by O. J. Simpson in the 1967 USC vs. UCLA football game. Another big factor was UCLA's acclaimed sophomore kicker Zenon Andrusyshyn missing a chip shot field goal, and having two field goals and an extra point attempt blocked.

1968

In what was acknowledged to be a rebuilding year, the Bruins opened the 1968 season with a 63–7 defeat of Pittsburgh and a win over Washington State. The season ground to a halt at Syracuse and with the season-ending injury of quarterback Billy Bolden, and UCLA would win only one more game, over Stanford 20–17. The Bruins gave #1 USC and Heisman Trophy winner O. J. Simpson a scare in a 28–16 loss; UCLA trailed 21–16 late in the fourth quarter and had the ball inside USC's 10-yard line, but USC recovered a fumble and then used almost all of the remaining time in driving for their insurance touchdown.