The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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DECEMBER 2019 THE WOLVERINE 61 WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The win put Michigan in the Rose Bowl for the first time since that 1950 season. The Wolverines routed Or- egon State, 34-7, scoring 34 unan- swered points to close out the game and finish No. 4 nationally. That's not what Mack remembers most, he admitted. "The most significant thing about the Rose Bowl that I remember is I met a nice young lady on a blind date," he recalled. "Here we are 53 years later — she's been my wife all that time. "Winning the Rose Bowl was icing on the cake. It was a thrill for all of us." The Big Ten sent only its cham- pion to a bowl back then and fea- tured a no-repeat rule. So in Mack's All-American senior season of 1965, it wound up national championship or bust. A 15-7 loss to Georgia in the sea- son's third game nudged the Wolver- ines toward the latter. "The problem, in some goofy way, was that we looked at the thing and figured we had to win all of the games to be national champions," Mack said. "There wasn't any place else to go. You couldn't go back to the Rose Bowl. "It was a question of, how can we make this whole thing work? We lost to Georgia, and the result of that took the air out of the balloon. We screwed up, and we were not going any place. The losses piled up from there — by two against Purdue, one at Min- nesota, two at home versus the Buck- eyes and so on. "You start thinking, what else can go wrong?" Mack said. "By the time we were done, we were 4-6. It was just one crummy game after another. We managed to play not anywhere near our potential, anywhere near what we had the year before." Mack left Michigan without a de- gree, his 123 semester hours still short of the 140 required for a bach- elor 's degree in engineering. In the spring of 1966, he should have quali- fied for a student military deferment to finish up. But the Los Angeles Rams — who'd claimed Mack as a first-round draft pick — were concerned about keeping him. They helped him get into the Army National Guard in California. The Rams were 8-6 his first sea- son, and although it proved their first winning season in close to a decade, they weren't going anywhere. "But I was," Mack quipped. "I ended up reporting for active duty in the Army, on the 10th of January. About a week and a half after I fin- ished playing football, I am reporting for basic training at Fort Ord up in Northern California." He took a night class at UCLA his first two years in the NFL, while spending the first six of his offsea- sons in the National Guard. He also found time to get back to Michigan to finish up his engineering degree in the spring of 1968. That fall, he was hired by Bechtel, a privately owned engineering/con- struction firm, noted for building the Hoover Dam, big cities in Saudi Arabia and more. He worked there 34 years, before going back to Pasa- dena to join Jacobs Engineering for six more. "I ended up with a 40-year engi- neering career which, on top of the football, was what I had planned to do all along," Mack said. "I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time." The eventual Pro Football Hall of Famer never missed a game in the 184 he enjoyed in the pros. "That's a monumental tribute to stupidity," he quipped, noting how often he played hurt. There wasn't anything stupid regarding how he went about his business, though — at Michigan and beyond. ❏ Mack was the No. 2 pick in the 1966 NFL Draft, made 11 Pro Bowls during his NFL career, earned eight All-Pro honors and was enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1999. PHOTO COURTESY MICHIGAN PHOTOGRAPHY The Tom Mack File Michigan Accomplishments: Started for the 1964 Big Ten and Rose Bowl champions, marking U-M's first league title since 1950 … Rose to All-America status in 1965 as a starting offensive tackle … Became the No. 2 overall pick by the Los Angeles Rams in the 1966 NFL Draft. Professional Accomplishments: Earned 11 Pro Bowl invitations on his way to the NFL Hall of Fame … Never missed a game in a 184-contest pro career … A key part of an NFL franchise that went 129-48-7 during his tenure, appearing in four NFC Championship games … Enjoyed a 40-year career in engineering, 34 of those at Bechtel … Worked as a project manager on a 1,300-megawatt nuclear unit in Arizona … Served as vice president in charge of the firm's Washington office, a key interface for the federal government. Michigan Memory: "There was a play in the Rose Bowl. It was a quick toss to our fullback, to the right. He had to take off and sweep the end, and then break upfield. Mel Anthony, for 30 years, held the Rose Bowl record [for its longest touchdown run], because he ran that play. I went out to the right, hooked the guy I was supposed to and as Mel broke up the field, he went back to the left. "I took off and actually caught up with him. They ran pictures of this for years. He ran 84 yards for a touchdown, our first touchdown against Oregon State. I was running next to him. I was jogging and he was running. I got noticed because I was an offensive tackle and I was running as fast as he was but I was not running as hard as he was. "The scary part was, I saw that film recently, and I almost tripped him on about the 5-yard line." Education: Earned his Bachelor of Engineering degree at the University of Michigan in 1968. Family: Married to Anne Mack, and the two have three grown daughters, Kristan, Katy and Cari.