When the College Football Hall of Fame changed its rules in 2006 to allow active coaches older than 75 to be eligible, it pushed back John Cooper’s election by two years.

Something good came of the delay, though, as Cooper was elected Thursday to the Hall of Fame in the same class as Randall McDaniel, the best player on a dominating offensive line that helped Cooper’s 1986 Arizona State team win the Rose Bowl and finish No. 4 in the nation.

Cooper and McDaniel are ASU’s third coach and fifth player to make the Hall of Fame. They are in a class of 15 announced Thursday that will be inducted Dec. 9 at a dinner in New York and enshrined at the Hall of Fame in South Bend, Ind., in summer 2009. ASU plans to honor its new inductees at a home football game still to be determined this fall.

Penn State’s Joe Paterno and Florida State’s Bobby Bowden were grandfathered into the Hall of Fame with the 2006 rule change, taking potential votes from Cooper.

Cooper is best known for 13 seasons at Ohio State and said he believes that Hall of Fame selectors might not have wanted two Big Ten coaches to be inducted in the same year.

“I knew with the record I had in college coaching eventually I would get in,” Cooper said. “I just didn’t know if I would live to see it.”

Cooper, 70, was 192-84-6 in 24 seasons, and 25-9-2 at ASU from 1985 to ‘87. He directed the Sun Devils to their first Pac-10 title and a 22-15 win over Michigan in the 1987 Rose Bowl, then was the coach of Ohio State when the Buckeyes beat ASU 20-17 in the 1997 Rose Bowl.

“All three years were special,” Cooper said. “I could have been very content to have stayed there. That ‘86 team was a great team. I came back from that bowl game and saw Miami and Penn State (play for the national title in the Fiesta Bowl), and we were better than either one.”

McDaniel was instrumental in that 10-1-1 season, playing guard on an offensive line made up entirely of players from Arizona and known as the Home Boys.

“I couldn’t do it without those guys,” McDaniel said of guard Todd Kalis, tackles Danny Villa and Jim Warne and center Kevin Thomas. “We didn’t want to let the state down.

“All thanks and credit goes to them.”

The athletic McDaniel, recruited as a tight end out of Avondale Agua Fria High, went on to become a consensus All-American in 1987 and a 12-time Pro Bowl selection, all but once with the Minnesota Vikings. He was a finalist this year for the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

“I really don’t know how you’re supposed to feel,” said McDaniel, 43, now a basic skills instructor at elementary schools in the Robbinsdale (Minn.) school district. “You take it and enjoy it for the moment. My big fear is you’ve got to get up and give a speech.”

McDaniel’s parents and siblings still live in Arizona.

Cooper, who lives in Columbus, Ohio, said going into the Hall of Fame with McDaniel makes it “even more special.”

“You never think someone there at that time would be going with you,” McDaniel said.

• Courtesy of azcentral.com…thanks! 

written by Roc