Pete Volk of SBNation reports that 63-year-old Gary Pinkel will step down as head coach of the Missouri Football team at the end of the 2015 season due to health issues, according to the university. Pinkel was diagnosed with lymphoma in May, and endured multiple treatments before the season. Pinkel was told by doctors the treatments would not effect his career which is why he came back in 2015.
Pinkel has coached Missouri for 15 seasons, maintaining a 117-71 record with the SEC program. Recently Pinkel made headlines by standing by his players who were attempting to boycott the football program unless the University’s president Tim Wolfe resigned. Wolfe resigned Monday after several protest demonstrations including walk-outs by faculty amidst accusations of racial inequality.
Pinkel mentioned his statement that he felt good going into the season, but decided the bye week would be the time to re-assess his situation. He also mentioned he still felt good, however he would like to spend the upcoming years with friends and family while giving his undivided attention to combating the disease. Pinkel will remain the head coach till the end of December, unless an interim head coach is named before that.
Pinkel took over Mizzou in the year 2000, and will leave as the winningest coach in the school’s history. Pinkel stands 19th in the NCAA FBS in most all-time wins. He lead Mizzou to win five conference division titles, and reached 10 bowl games winning six of them. In 2007 Pinkel was named the National Coach of the Year in 2007. Pinkel was a graduate of Kent State University where he was an all-conference and honorable mention All-American tight end.
Below are quotes from Pinkel’s public statement provided by MUTigers.com:
“I made the decision in May, after visiting with my family, that I wanted to keep coaching, as long as I felt good and had the energy I needed. I felt great going into the season, but also knew that I would need to re-assess things at some point, and I set our bye week as the time when I would take stock of the future. After we played Vanderbilt (Oct. 24), I had a scheduled PET scan on Oct. 26thfor reassessment, and then visited with my family and came to the decision on October 27th that this would be my last year coaching.”
“I still feel good physically, but I decided that I want to focus on enjoying my remaining years with my family and friends, and also have proper time to battle the disease and give full attention to that.”
“I want to make very clear that I’m not doing poorly, and that this is a manageable disease, but it’s one that will never go away.”
“So many people have bigger struggles with other forms of cancer and other serious diseases, and I feel blessed that I’ve got something I can fight and still enjoy a good quality of life. I don’t know how many years I have left, but I want to turn my focus to life outside of the daily grind of football.”
“Words can’t express how grateful I am to the University of Missouri and all of the amazing people who make it up, from the administration to the students and our fans. Obviously, I’m so appreciative to all of my coaches and athletes. Leaving them makes this decision so tough, but I do so feeling good that the Mizzou Football program is in a better place than it was when we came in 15 years ago. I feel that Mizzou is a great job at a great school and has so much going for it that they’ll find an outstanding coach to move the program forward.”
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