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football Edit

Meet the staff: Curtis Luper

In a series of stories over the next few weeks, PowerMizzou is going in-depth with Missouri's assistant coaches to give Tiger fans a better idea of who the coaches are and what led them to this point. You can find our most recent Q&A, with defensive assistant Charlie Haribson, right here.

How did you get started in football? What was your first exposure to the game?

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CL: "I grew up in Texas. In the Dallas area, Sherman, Texas. Football was a way of life. And still is a way of life. As long as I can remember I wanted to play football. I grew up a Dallas Cowboys fan watching Tony Dorsett. That's just how I started. When I grew up, everybody played football."

Did you play other sports too?

CL: "All of them. Football, basketball, track. Played all of them."

Your path is a little bit different. You play at Oklahoma State from 1984 to 1987 and then you've got a five year break where you're in the Army before you finish up your career. Tell me that story from your last year at OSU until you go back and finish up at Stephen F. Austin.

CL: "Had a couple good running backs at Oklahoma State back then (Thurman Thomas and Barry Sanders). The depth chart was pretty deep. There were a couple Hall of Famers. After four years at Oklahoma State, still had another year of eligibility, I just said 'Let's do something different.' I was in the military for five years. I grew up as a military brat so I'm sure I had an affinity for it and I still do for the military in particular. I went home over spring break 1987 and the recruiter's office was right across from my mother's apartment, so I went over to the Army recruiter, we talked, signed up, took the test, I did very well. They said, 'Hey, you could be in military intelligence or air traffic control.' I said, 'Stop, I'll take air traffic control.' I went to college to play football and get a degree and at that point I hadn't done either very much so I wanted to do something to succeed. I was a great air traffic controller and it was very satisfying. Standing here today, I can only see myself, if I wasn't coaching, I would be doing that. That's the only thing I could see myself doing if I wasn't coaching."

That has the reputation of being the most stressful job you can have. Is it that? Did you enjoy it?

CL: "It was both. Once I finished the Army's air traffic control school, it was one of the most satisfying and gratifying things I had done up to that point. We started 47, we graduated seven. There are the numbers for you...Ultimately the pilot is in charge of the souls on that airplane. That's just kind of the way you look at it. Being an air traffic controller, you have to have some foresight obviously to be able to see into the future, but it's really standard, your training really comes into play if something bad happens like the weather gets really bad. But I loved it."

A lot of military terms get thrown around in football and a lot of football people make that comparison. Having been in both, are there similarities or is that overstated?

CL: "There are definite similarities. Football is the ultimate team sport. There's 11 guys out there at any one time. There's 11 on special teams, there's 11 on offense, there's 11 on defense. And there's 120 of us on the team, players that is. Then you add in the coaching staff and the support staff, you're talking about 150 people that have to be on one accord. Have to become a team and have to develop as a team and move in one specific direction with one specific goal. We have a specific chain of command as well. It starts with our President (the head coach), all the way down to our student manager."

So you're in the military for five years. What leads you to go back to Stephen F. Austin at 27 years old?

CL: "Yeah, I'm 26 when I got out in October. I was just on a daily run and I said, 'I think I can still play.' That morning as I was awaiting air traffic control academy, because I was going to be a civilian air traffic controller, just literally on that run and within 24 hours I called Oklahoma State and they told me I probably had another year because my clock stopped because of the military, I think it was an old World War II clause. And then I called the NCAA, they called me back, I got verification. My high school coach, his name is John Pearce. John had left my high school, which is Sherman High School, and had gone on to actually Thurman Thomas' high school, who was my college teammate, in Houston which was Willow Ridge and turned them into a power and had moved up to Texas A&M as an assistant of R.C. Slocum and subsequently had gotten the Stephen F. Austin head job. I called him, he said 'Come on.'

How did that year go?

CL: "It was great. When I write the book, and one day I will, that'll be the longest chapter in it. It was a phenomenal year. 1993. Playing football again when you never thought you would play again. Played running back, rushed for over 1,000 yards, we won. We went to the Division IAA playoffs, which is now the FCS playoffs. I got a chance to play with my high school head coach and with his son, who when I graduated high school was in the fourth grade and had written a story 'when I grow up I want to be Curtis Luper' or something like that. So we actually were teammates. The stars were just aligned. I couldn't have written a better script. My last game (at Oklahoma State) was Christmas Day, 1987. December 25th 1987. And my first game (at SFA) was like September 3, 1993."

At what point did you make the decision to go into coaching?

CL: "I tell everybody, I'm 27 in the huddle with 18 and 19 year olds. I was coaching then. I really was. I had already played four years of college football and was in the military for four years. I was coaching then and didn't even know it. Gene Chizik, who was the head coach at Auburn, was on that staff. He was the defensive coordinator. That's how I got into college because I started coaching there. I went to the Houston Oilers as an undrafted free agent. Coach Pearce had promised me a coaching job so I went back and was Gene Chizik's GA. That's how I started coaching."

You're 28, 29 and most GAs are straight out of college. I know those first few years in coaching can be pretty tough financially. What's your family situation and being almost 30 years old, had you saved money where you were all right?

CL: "It was a definite struggle. I had the GI bill supplement me. I finished my undergraduate and I got a Master's there at Stephen F. Austin and I learned how to coach from the ground up. From ground zero being a student assistant or graduate assistant. It was beneficial and it was part of a process."

Everybody knows as an assistant coach you move a ton, you were a military kid growing up. Up until TCU (2013) do you know the longest you ever lived in one place?

CL: "Four years. Four at Auburn and four at Oklahoma State."

Is that something you've enjoyed?

CL: "Yeah, you know, I moved around as a child. I lived in Germany, I lived in California. I moved around as a child. There's less fear of change and the unknown. My children have moved around a lot. They have no concerns relative to distance."

At this point, is your goal still ultimately to be a head coach?

CL: "I'm 54 years old, but I'm a young 54. Absolutely. My immediate goal is for us to win here and to do the very best job for my very good friend Eli Drinkwitz. I think the rest will handle itself."

I know this is different than anyone has ever experienced. What's it like being a coach during all this?

CL: "Well, we always lead the race in athletics. We're at the front of the pack when it comes to societal changes. I'm pretty sure that sports, I just read where the PGA Tour is going to come back and play in June. I'm pretty sure that sports will lead the way as our country rebounds from the coronavirus. We'll be right there with it."

I know you've only been here three or four months, but what has your experience been like at Missouri getting to know the area and how does it compare to what you expected?

CL: "The first thing I did, I Googled Columbia, Missouri. I said, '120 thousand. Perfect size.' You'll have everything you need, you won't need to go to St. Louis or Kansas City for anything we need. That was really appealing, the size of the city and most college towns are really, really progressive. I was walking through the airport my first week here in St. Louis and somebody said "M-I-Z." I didn't know that I was supposed to say "Z-O-U" back to them. But I've learned that and I've learned a lot of Mizzou customs in the short time I've been here."

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