Penn State University celebrates Coach Joe Paterno’s life, mourns his death.

Pennsylvania State University today concluded its week-long tribute to legendary football coach Joe Paterno, celebrating his life and mourning his loss in a memorial ceremony that featured a number of distinguished alumni from his six decades as head coach, and which ended in an emotional eulogy delivered by the Coach’s son, Jay.  Paterno died Sunday night of complications from lung cancer; he was 85.

Coach Paterno goes into the record books with more wins than any other coach in college football history—a total of 409, and he led the Nittany Lions to two national championships and five undefeated seasons, including one team that went thirty straight games without a loss.  Paterno also stands-out as the only coach to win all five premier “bowl” games—Rose, Orange, Fiesta, and Sugar, and Cotton.  As several speakers at Thursday’s memorial commented, however, Paterno was even more distinguished by the fact that he and his teams went forty-four successful seasons without an NCAA investigation into any kind of violation or irregularity; no other active coach can match that claim.

Paterno and his family were fixtures in the community around the University, frequently welcoming students and distinguished visitors into their home.  In their memorial remarks, several of Paterno’s former all-Americans made it clear the Paternos kept their door open, describing late-night visits to the coach’s house; several alumni described Paterno as the father they never had.  Just as importantly, students and faculty from the Paterno Undergraduate Fellows Program praised the Coach for his dedication to the classics and humanities.  Consistent with Paterno’s values and ethics, the unique undergraduate Fellows program allows all interested students to enroll and then earn honors, distinction, and Fellowships on the strength of their hard work, community service, and scholarship. Several speakers also praised and thanked Joe and Sue Paterno for their $4 million donation to the university for construction of the library which bears their name.

Alluding to but never explicitly mentioning widespread corruption in college athletics, many of Thursday’s memorial speakers spoke about Coach Paterno’s “Great Experiment”: Paterno insisted his teams would achieve “success with honor,” and he also insisted his players would persist in and graduate from college—a rare and controversial premise when Paterno assumed the head coaching position in 1966.  Until recently, the NCAA  had no standards for graduation rates among college scholarship athletes, and some elite schools graduated fewer than one in five of their “blue chip” players.  Pundits credit Paterno with leading the initiative to end exploitation of college athletes.

“The 800 pound gorilla in the room.”

All but one of Thursday’s speakers scrupulously avoided mention of the sexual-abuse scandal which has rocked the Penn State football program and campus community since late October, 2011.  The scandal ultimately cost Paterno hand the University President their jobs.  Although Paterno was just weeks from retirement, university trustees fired Paterno on November 5, 2011, alleging he had failed to take proper measures when a former graduate assistant came forward with charges defensive coach Jerry Sandusky had molested boys in a campus-sponsored youth sports program.

Nike Chairman Phil Knight, however, spoke directly to the point, saying, “It turns out he gave full disclosure to his superiors, information that went up the chain to the head of the campus police and the president of the school.  The matter was in the hands of a world-class university and a president with an outstanding national reputation. Whatever the details of the investigation are, this much is clear to me: if there is a villain in this tragedy, it lies in that investigation, not in Joe Paterno.”  Knight went on to rebuke the trustees, recounting Paterno’s accomplishments, contributions, and unwavering integrity, finally demanding, “”Who is the real trustee at Penn State University?”  As Knight finished his question, the standing-room-only assembly of more than 12,000 mourners accorded Knight by far the longest and loudest of several standing ovations during the ceremony.

Concluding the ceremony, Jay Paterno, the Coach’s son and a former Nittany Lion quarterback coach, reassured his audience that his father died with a clear conscience.  Jay Paterno stressed, “Among the things he accomplished in his life, it was the games he won that counted the least,” Jay, one of the Coach’s five children, “His impact reached to men who worked for him, to Penn State students, to people he never met. One mourner told me Wednesday: ‘Your family’s not very good at math. Your father has millions of children and grandchildren.’ ”