Throwback Thursday - September 2nd, 1995

9-2-95

30 years ago this very week, Tyrone Willingham was preparing for the very

first game of his head coaching career, preparing to lead The Cardinal

against San Jose State of the Big West Conference, coached by former two-

time Rose Bowl-winning Stanford head coach John Ralston. In 1995, the

South Bay rivalry game was billed the “Silicon Valley Kick-Off Classic”, which

has evolved into the “Bill Walsh Legacy Game”. That year, it was being

played in San Jose for the first time since the series first began in 1900.

Willingham was trying to turn around and tighten up a Stanford team that

had suffered back-to-back losing seasons under the legendary Bill Walsh,

despite a highly effective West Coast Offense led by record-setting

quarterback Steve Stenstrom.

Stanford’s high-octane offense featured fifth-year senior quarterback Mark

Butterfield of Antioch High, a talented backfield including prep All-American

Mike Mitchell and speedy Texan Anthony Bookman, JC All-American tight end,

the late Greg Clark, wide receiver and blazing return specialist Damon Dunn,

and a rising transfer wide receiver from Ricks College (now BYU-Idaho), a

married 25-year old Mormon by the name of Mark “100%” Harris. Harris

remains one of the most immediately impactful transfers from the pre-portal

era, a relative rarity at Stanford back in the 1990s.

Leading the way on the offensive line were fifth-year senior center T.J.

Gaynor and first-team All-Pac-10 left tackle Jeff Buckey, whose son Zach

Buckey (#98) is a fifth-year senior defensive lineman for the Cardinal in

2025. Incidentally, Buckey, Clark and Harris would all later play in the NFL for

the San Francisco 49ers.

The always scrappy Spartans were led by a feisty 5’7” running back,

coincidentally also named “Walsh”, Patrick Walsh (no relation), who is

currently in his 25th season as head coach at Serra High School in San Mateo,

CA. Walsh is also the founder of Next Level Sports, an outstanding youth

sports program which currently plays some of its football league’s games on

the Stanford campus.

Stanford would come out on top that evening of September 2, 1995, by the

score of 47-33, with Bookman rushing for 133 yards on 18 carries. Despite an

dislocated elbow injury to Mitchell, the relentless Cardinal run game really

got rolling against the Spartans, producing 228 yards on 44 carries. Dunn

returned a kick-off 91 yards for a touchdown and Harris had a 49-yard

touchdown reception.

Our head coach was pleased, but far from satisfied. Said Willingham after the

win, “I take it a game at a time, because I’ve been told you are only as good

as your next outing. That’s the way I approach things...it only matters

whether you’re better than your opponent the week you play your

opponent”.

A rock-solid take and excellent advice for our new coach Frank Reich and the

2025 Cardinal as the ever-improving team heads to Provo, UT to take on the

Bachmeiers and their BYU Cougars on Saturday night!

Note: In 1995, the consensus of pre-season publications was for the re-

building Cardinal to finish dead last, 10th in the Pac-10 Conference. And yet,

inspired by Willingham’s iron will, discipline, and toughness, Stanford would

end up producing an impressive 7-3-1 (5-3) regular season campaign and

was rewarded with an invitation to the 1995 Liberty Bowl in Memphis, TN.

Outstanding barbeque on Beale Street and Graceland visit was epic!

We had the opportunity to have a conversation with Coach Willingham about

the start of the 1995 season, and he shared how the lessons from 30 years

ago still apply to bringing the Cardinal back to the top today!

Willingham on 1995:

SFAU: The date was September 2nd, 1995, now 30 years ago, you become

the head coach of Stanford Football. You’re following the great Bill Walsh –

one of the most accomplished football coaches of all time, but the program

had suffered through back-to-back losing seasons. You arrive. You’re 40 years

old. Your first game is on the road against San Jose State. Tell us about your

approach to this opportunity with a talented group and how you created the

culture you did that kicked off a run of exciting and successful years on the

farm?

TW: I had coached with Dennis Green. Denny’s formula was that we would

build an offensive line first. You run the football; it makes your defense

better. Bill Walsh wanted to throw the ball, and we wanted to use the passing

game, but more when we needed to. It was a more blue-collar approach, to a

degree. In 1995, we changed the approach. We wanted to run the football...

and we did.

Success starts with the offensive line. You often can find offensive lineman

who want to be part of a unit. If they feel that they’re respected, they stay.

That opportunity for loyalty and building a culture of commitment is

something Stanford can use to their advantage even today!

Stanford doesn’t really need to look anywhere, but at Stanford itself.

Everywhere you looked around on campus back in 1989, and again in 1995,

there was success. If success is happening everywhere else, what’s wrong

with football? At that time, it seemed like everyone was winning, and football

should to.

John Ralston, Bill Walsh and Denny Green all had success in building the

culture of the program. Excellence was the standard. Great students. Great

football players. We decided we would win. That was the expectation.

Stanford students win every day. That is what they do. During our run from

1995 to 2001, that was our approach.

There is now stability at the top, a new university president. That is critically

important. Changes to the current environment of college football need to

be made. Since Stanford is the national role model in terms of what it means

to be a student-athlete, the university needs to lead actively at the national

level.

While Coach doesn’t recall every single detail from those games 30 years

ago, when asked if he recalled being a perfect 10-0 versus Cal as an

assistant (3-0) and a head coach (7-0), he pointed out that in his garage, he

has a jersey, half red and half blue, with a “10” on the red side and a “0” on

the blue side! Classic!