Pueblo howling about return of college football

ThunderWolves play Saturday for first time since '84

By Pat Rooney, Special to the Rocky

Published September 3, 2008 at 4:40 p.m.

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John Jaques / Pueblo Chieftain

CSU-Pueblo president Joe Garcia (center in red) speaks at the Neta and Eddie DeRose ThunderBowl stadium ribbon-cutting. CSU-Pueblo is fielding a football team for the first time since 1984.

CSU-Pueblo defensive lineman Victor Quintana, left, fights his way past offensive lineman Cris Weeks during a recent practice.

Photo by Bryen Kelsen/Pueblo Chieftain

CSU-Pueblo football coach John Wristen is getting his ThunderWolves ready for their season opener Saturday, a game that will mark the return of college football to the school for the first time since 1984.

There's a Kay Becher on almost every campus in the country, the kind of guy who shows up at every athletic event decked out in school colors while toting pompoms, pennants and the occasional foam finger.

Becher's school of choice is Colorado State-Pueblo. His team, the red, white and blue-garbed ThunderWolves.

It doesn't matter there has been little to cheer about on the Pueblo campus over the years, especially after football was dropped in a campuswide financial cut after the 1984 season.

Becher has attended thousands of athletic events, cheering on the basketball teams, the cross country runners, the soccer squads, through good times and lean.

Disappointments never dissuaded Kay or his wife, Madge. They met in anatomy class while attending CSU-Pueblo (formerly Southern Colorado) in the 1940s and raised two kids in Pueblo, one of whom followed in their footsteps to the school.

Rain or shine, win or lose, Becher usually was in the seats.

On Saturday, Becher finally will be in the seat he long has coveted - a spot in the bleachers as his beloved ThunderWolves revive a football program that has been missing from the football-mad city for almost 25 years.

"I've been to just about everything there in the past 46 years," Becher said. "There is a lot of excitement around town. I've sat through football games in blizzards. I remember when we were a junior college and the basketball team won the nationals. We have a lot of memories in athletics. A lot of good memories."

When the first ThunderWolves football team in 24 years kicks off the 2008 season in the new Neta and Eddie DeRose ThunderBowl, it will erase two-plus decades of frustration for the football fanatics of Pueblo.

The school already has seen a surge in enrollment and boasts one of the finest football field houses among all Division II programs.

"When we lost football people were upset, but people had stopped going. I think this thing is going to stick around," said Becher, 82, who played for the school's basketball team in 1943 and 1944. "As soon as they had tickets, I bought them. The stadium is really nice. They have done a lot of things with the Massari gym and at the university that I'm thrilled about. I just hope people support this like they should."

Early indications are support for the relaunched ThunderWolves will be through the roof.

The new ThunderBowl has an official capacity of about 7,000, but with standing-room tickets being sold for both open ends of the stadium, school officials believe up to 15,000 will be there Saturday night to witness history.

Starting from scratch

Saturday's opener against Oklahoma Panhandle State will be the culmination of a painstaking year-plus process of assembling a roster undertaken by coach John Wristen and his staff.

Until Jan. 1, Wristen had only two assistants to help him scour state high schools, as well as junior colleges, for his inaugural team. The rest of the staff came on board after the New Year.

"We've got a lot of guys in here that are starting to come along," said former Broncos running back Steve Sewell, who joined Wristen's staff after working as an assistant at Grandview High School.

"I've been in Denver, where everyone loves the Broncos, and in Oklahoma, where they love the Sooners. You kind of feel that down here, where people are really loving the fact that the program is back. We're excited about it. We're ready to go and see where we are. We know it's going to be uphill, it's going to be a battle, but we're going to get better every day."

By all appearances, Wristen is the perfect man to lead CSU-Pueblo's resurrection. He is a native son, a former standout quarterback at Pueblo South High who still holds many of CSU-Pueblo's passing records.

Wristen served under former University of Colorado coach Gary Barnett at CU and Northwestern and, before coming home, worked as an assistant at UCLA.

Moving from prominent Division I-A programs to relative anonymity running a team that has been dormant for 24 years means little to a man whose heart remains in Pueblo.

"We still have a lot of work to do to get this young team ready, but it has been a lot of fun," Wristen said.

"I think whenever you have a chance to come home and invest in something that was part of your life, and you get to come back and rebuild it, restructure it, of course there will be a little personal touch you didn't have at other places."

The longest yards

The sure-to-be raucous overflow crowd, combined with a matchup with an Oklahoma Panhandle State team that began the season with a 27-game losing streak, could help get the new era of CSU-Pueblo football off to a rousing start.

"It seems like you can't go anywhere wearing a CSU-Pueblo football shirt without someone stopping to talk to you about how excited they are about the season," said defensive end Chase Vaughn, a Smoky Hill High School graduate who transferred from Adams State.

"Whatever happens, we're going to bring it every Saturday."

Still, no one doubts there will be growing pains in the respected Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference. Despite a solid number of transfers, including a glut of athletes from Adams State College who left after that school's offseason coaching change, the ThunderWolves will be dominated by players with little college football experience.

The bright side, though, is the decision by the school's athletic department to accept the efforts of the Pueblo organization Friends of Football - a group of former athletes and local businessmen who spearheaded the football program's revival - was not made with an eye focused solely on gridiron glory.

CSU-Pueblo also will be launching new wrestling and women's track and field programs this year. The field house already is the gem of the RMAC, a state-of-the-art football headquarters complete with a locker room, offices, meeting rooms and an impressive weight room.

"I'll say this: We've raised the bar with our entire program with all this excitement around the football program, and it's spilling over into our whole athletics program," athletic director Joe Folda said. "We believe this is our time to really grow and develop as a program. We want to become that premier athletics program in the RMAC within three years, and that's across the board."

In short, CSU-Pueblo is eager to build a culture that, beginning Saturday, might keep some wide-eyed youngster from around town rooting for the ThunderWolves as long as Becher has.

• September 3, 2008

  9:11 p.m.

  Suggest removal

  platoro79 writes:

  Welcome back CSU-Pueblo glad to see football wrestling and women's track back in your school

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