Ralph Miller (American football)

Last updated
Ralph Miller
No. 62
Position: Guard
Personal information
Born: (1948-08-13) August 13, 1948 (age 75)
Hartford, Alabama
Height:6 ft 3 in (1.91 m)
Weight:260 lb (118 kg)
Career information
College: Cal Lutheran
Career history
Player stats at PFR

Ralph Miller (born August 13, 1948) is an American football player. Besides being a founding member of the National Football League Players Association, Miller has played for NFL teams New Orleans Saints, the Houston Oilers, the Philadelphia Eagles, the San Diego Chargers, the New York Giants, and the San Francisco 49ers. He later served as President of the Los Angeles County Deputy Probation Officers Union since 1997. [1] Prior to his professional football career, he was a collegiate football player for the Kingsmen team at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, California. [2] Miller migrated to California after having attended Alabama State University and became a notable player in the 1971 NAIA Division II Football National Championship. He was active in the civil rights movement in Alabama and became a mortgage banker and a Los Angeles County probation officer. He chaired the Black Student Union and the Third World Alliance at California Lutheran University, and later joined the Houston Oilers as a free agent and played five years in the National, Canadian and World Football Leagues. [3] [4]

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The 1971 NAIA Division II football season was the 16th season of college football sponsored by the NAIA and the second season of play of the NAIA's lower division for football. The season was played from August to November 1971 and culminated in the 1971 NAIA Division II Football National Championship, played on December 11, 1971 in Thousand Oaks, California, on the campus of California Lutheran University.

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The 1971 Pacific Tigers football team represented the University of the Pacific (UOP) in the 1971 NCAA University Division football season as a member of the Pacific Coast Athletic Association.

The 1971 UC Santa Barbara Gauchos football team represented the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) as a member of the Pacific Coast Athletic Association (PCAA) during the 1971 NCAA University Division football season. Led by Andy Everest in his second and final season as head coach, the Gauchos compiled an overall record of 3–8 with a mark of 2–3 in conference play, tying for fourth place in the PCAA. The team played home games at Campus Stadium in Santa Barbara, California.

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Robert F. Shoup is a retired American football coach and former player. He was the head coach at California Lutheran University from 1962 to 1989, compiling a career coaching record of 185–87–6. Shoup led Cal Lutheran to the NAIA Division II Football Championship in 1971. 186 of his players would later become coaches. He also helped to bring the Dallas Cowboys NFL team to the university. He was able to spend time around the team's players and coaches, including Tom Landry, and was able to pick up techniques for his team. Landry and Shoup also put together two major events each summer: a coaching clinic that drew as many as 500 people and a charity function known as the Christian Businessmen's Club Day. He was also the head coach for the college's golf program for ten years, 1976-1986.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cal Lutheran Kingsmen and Regals</span> California Lutheran University varsity teams

The Cal Lutheran Kingsmen and Regals are the athletic teams that represent California Lutheran University, located in Thousand Oaks, California, in intercollegiate sports as a member of the Division III level of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), primarily competing in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) since the 1991–92 academic year. The Kingsmen and Regals previously competed in the Golden State Athletic Conference (GSAC) of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) 1986–87 to 1988–89; and as an NAIA Independent from 1989–90 to 1990–91.

Donald Robert Green was the architect of the track and field team at California Lutheran University. Green coached 44 students that received All-American honours during his 21 years at Cal Lutheran. He has also coached football and track at Pomona High School, leading the track team there to an 117-meet winning streak. After twenty years at Pomona, he became head coach for California Lutheran's track team, which had never won a meet. He brought the team to 98 wins in a row over the next fifteen seasons while competing in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA). Besides being the head track coach at California Lutheran, he was also an assistant football coach at there for nine years and the athletic director for five years in the 1970s. He filed an age-discrimination claim after he was forced to retire in 1991.

The 1971 Cal Lutheran Kingsmen football team was an American football team that represented California Lutheran University as an independent during the 1971 NAIA Division II football season. In their tenth season under head coach Bob Shoup, the Kingsmen compiled an undefeated 8–0–2 record and won the NAIA Division II national championship, defeating Westminster (Pennsylvania), 30–14, in the championship game.

References

  1. "Ralph Miller | The Guardian". the Guardian. Retrieved Mar 29, 2019.
  2. Miller, Ralph (Feb 15, 2014). "Finally, America's college football players are standing up for their rights | Ralph Miller" . Retrieved Mar 29, 2019 via www.theguardian.com.
  3. "That Championship Season : In 1971, Cal Lutheran Outraced Tensions to NAIA Title". Los Angeles Times. November 21, 1985.
  4. "When They Were Kings : Cal Lutheran Threw a Little Magic Into Its Ethnic Mix to Win National Title in 1971". Los Angeles Times. October 18, 1996.