Lasting legacy
Frank Broyles, legendary football coach and athletics director at Arkansas dies at 92,
Frank Broyles, who led the Arkansas Razorbacks football team to the most wins in school history, has died, the school announced Monday. He was 92.
Broyles died from complications of Alzheimer’s disease, according to a statement from his family.
“He passed peacefully in his home surrounded by his loved ones,” the statement said.
Broyles coached at Arkansas from 1958 until 1976, compiling a
144-58-5 record. His Razorbacks teams won seven Southwest Conference championships. His 1964 team was named national champion by the Football Writers Association of America. That team was his best at Arkansas, going
11-0. That was the last Razorbacks team to go undefeated.
He had four teams that won at least 10 games, and he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1983.
When he retired from coaching, Broyles was the primary color commentator for ABC Sports, working alongside play-by-play man Keith Jackson from 1977 to 1985.
Broyles was named athletics director at Arkansas in 1974, a position he held until 2007. He led an overhaul and upgrade of Arkansas’ facilities — as well as leading the school in its move to the Southeastern Conference. Under his leadership, the school won 43 national championships.
He was responsible for the hiring of basketball coaches Eddie Sutton and Nolan Richardson as well as Lou Holtz and Ken Hatfield in football. Broyles also hired former great John McDonnell in track and field. McDonnell won 40 national championships with the Razorbacks, and Richardson led Arkansas to the 1994 national title in men’s basketball.
Broyles retired as AD in 2007, moving into a fundraising role with the school’s Razorback Foundation until his retirement from that role in 2014.
“He was an Arkansas treasure who devoted his life to others — from student-athletes to his support of Alzheimer’s research. He was an example for young people to follow, and that alone reflects a life well lived,” Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson said in a statement.
Several prominent football figures were members of the undefeated 1964 football team, including Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, former Miami Hurricanes and Dallas coach Jimmy Johnson and Hatfield.
“He’s a life teacher,” Jones told the Associated Press in 2014. “He always spoke about football as it related to life. ... All things pointed to life’s lessons.”