Former college, NFL coach dies at 76

Ron Meyer, the football coach behind SMU’s powerhouse “Pony Express” teams who later called for a snowplow to clear a spot so the New England Patriots could kick the winning field goal against Miami in one of the NFL’s most memorable moments, has died. He was 76.

Meyer died Tuesday after collapsing with an aortic aneurism while playing golf in the Austin suburb of Lakeway, his family said in a statement.

“It’s no accident that at every stop he coached down-trodden teams to great heights. He gave them hope. They believed in him. And he showed them the way,” the Meyer family said.

“Devastated to hear the passing of my coach and great friend Ron Meyer. My mom and I loved Coach Meyer. He was a great man,” tweeted former NFL star Eric Dickerson, who played for Meyer at SMU from 1979-1981.

That was SMU’s heyday, when the Mustangs, led by running backs Dickerson and Craig James, turned a middling program into a Southwest Conference champion before it skidded toward the NCAA’s “death penalty” ruling for jawdropping rules violations.

Meyer won 27 games in three seasons at UNLV before taking the job at SMU in 1976. After early struggles, the program - which had already been sanctioned by the NCAA for infractions before Meyer arrived — took off as wealthy boosters, fueled by the region’s economic boom of the late 1970s and early 1980s, got caught up in a payment scheme designed to bring in top players. The cheating survived long after Meyer left for the NFL and eventually led the NCAA to first put the program on probation in 1985 then shut it down in 1987.

Meyer left SMU before the harshest sanctions hit, taking over the Patriots in 1982. He would spend parts of nine seasons in the NFL. He is survived by wife Cindy, four children and grandchildren.