Snyder forever linked to magical '96 season

They didn’t have a single story. Not one.

They all thought about it – Grey Ruegamer and Kyle Murphy, Keith Poole and Juan Roque – but they couldn’t come up with a single anecdote about Bruce Snyder.

Which, when you think about it, is probably the greatest tribute of all.

“It was never about Bruce Snyder,” Murphy said of the former Arizona State football coach, who died of cancer Monday at the age of 69. “It was always about the team.”

ASU has had its share of colorful coaches – Frank Kush, Bill Frieder, Pat Murphy – but Snyder wasn’t one of them. He loved family, friends and football, and at the end of the day he liked nothing better than to sit on the patio of his vacation home in Lake Tahoe, Nev., and watch the sun set.

Simple pleasures, really, but Snyder was not an ordinary man, for the words used to describe him upon his death – classy, honorable, principled – were the same ones often spoken during his life.

“He helped all of us grow up,” said Poole, a wide receiver from 1993 to 1996. “All the lessons a man should teach his son, he taught us.”

Snyder’s record at ASU (58-47 from 1992 to 2000) was nothing special. But he’ll forever be remembered – and treasured – for authoring one of the three greatest seasons in modern-day Sun Devil history.

There was the 1975 team that finished 12-0 and beat Nebraska in the Fiesta Bowl. There was the 1986 team that went 10-1-1 and conquered Michigan in the Rose Bowl.

And, of course, there was Snyder’s 1996 team that finished 11-1 and came within 140 seconds of winning a national championship.

That ’96 club was a collection of larger-than-life characters – Pat Tillman, Jake Plummer, Ruegamer, Roque, Derrick Rodgers – but it was Snyder who molded them and inspired them and was smart enough set his ego aside and let his seniors run the locker room.

“In the end it was his team,” said Roque, a starting tackle from 1994 to ’96. “We played for Bruce Snyder.”

The memories from that season are still vivid: The 19-0 victory over Nebraska; the crazy 42-34 victory over UCLA in which Plummer ran for touchdown, threw for a TD and caught a scoring pass; the heartbreaking 20-17 Rose Bowl loss to Ohio State.

But there is little memory of Snyder that year, and that was by design. Snyder understood he didn’t have to be front and center all the time. He had assistant coaches he could rely on, and the lessons he had handed down over the years – be tough; play hard; punish them; and, of course, “One at a Time,” – had become ingrained in the locker room and on the field.

“He didn’t feel he had to have a hand in everything,” said Murphy, the starting left tackle from 1995 to 1997. “He was just a great manager.”

One example: The night before the Nebraska game, the Sun Devil upperclassmen all but demanded the coaches leave the meeting room at the team hotel. Snyder didn’t argue. He knew nothing he could say would be as powerful or as meaningful as what his seniors had on their minds.

“He let the seniors lead,” said Ruegamer, a starting offensive lineman from ’96 to 1998. “He had a good grasp of what was going on. It was understood that if the upperclassmen told you (freshmen, sophomores) to do something, you did it. There was no arguing. If there was something wrong it was addressed by the seniors way before Coach ever dealt with it.”

That doesn’t mean Snyder was an absentee coach. If Ruegamer was whistled for a personal foul – as he was often – he knew he’d get a four-letter earful from Snyder when he walked off the field.

And heaven forbid if a player wasn’t tough. Poole recalled getting hit by five defenders on one play and hearing his shoulder blade crack. As he slowly got up, a look of pain on his face, Snyder yelled at him, “Don’t show them that! Get off the field!”

“He was hard-nosed and tough,” Poole said. “He didn’t let you slack off.”

The players never seemed to mind when Snyder got on them, though. They knew: Whatever he was saying – or yelling – was in their best interest, not just as football players but as young men.

“I could never say no to the man,” Roque said. “If he told me to run into a wall full speed with my head down, I was going to do it. The reason I’m successful today is because of what he taught me.”

Too often, someone’s life is not reflected upon until their death. That wasn’t the case with Snyder. He may have died too soon, but he died knowing what people thought of him:

He was a good coach and a good man.

1996 ASU Sun Devils

Sept. 7: ASU 45, Washington 42

Sept. 14: ASU 52, North Texas 7

Sept. 21: ASU 19, Nebraska 0

Sept. 28: ASU 48, Oregon 27

Oct. 5: ASU 50, Boise State 7

Oct. 12: ASU 42, UCLA 34

Oct. 19: ASU 48, USC 35, 2OT

Oct. 26: ASU 41, Stanford 9

Nov. 2: ASU 29, Oregon State 14

Nov. 9: ASU 35, California 7

Nov. 23: ASU 56, Arizona 14

Jan. 1: Ohio State 20, ASU 17