Exploring Bo's Background: Forged in steel BY MITCH SHERMAN WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio — The lunchroom at Cardinal Mooney High School appears ordinary. Students eat at round tables. Teachers mingle. Look closer. It's anything but ordinary. Mooney football coach P.J. Fecko points to a sophomore in a red sweatshirt at a table not far from the front of the room. Hes a defensive lineman, probably a future college prospect. The name is Mark Pelini, nephew and namesake of Mark "Bo" Pelini, the Nebraska coach and former Mooney football and basketball star. Sitting on either side of young Mark? Joe and John Stoops, the twin sons of Ron Stoops, Mooneys defensive coordinator. Ron is a brother to Bob, Mike and Mark — all Mooney grads — and the oldest son of Ron Stoops Sr., the legend himself. "We've been accused of cloning people," said Paul Gregory, the Mooney alumni director. Thirty years pass, and not much changes here. Not at Cardinal Mooney, and not in Youngstown. "People move on," said Tony Congemi, an assistant coach for nearly two decades at Mooney and a lifelong Youngstown resident, "but the toughness stays." A steely toughness defines Youngstown and its famous sons, from Bob Stoops, the esteemed Oklahoma coach, to former world champion boxer Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini and Bo Pelini. Pelini's hometown sits along nine exits off Interstate 80 in northeast Ohio. It defines the rust belt image of heavy industry and a harsh past. Visit and youll discover how it all fits together: The NU coach. His family. This town. Its legacy in athletics. And the high school, at the center of it all. You want to know Pelini? First, understand Youngstown. Steel Valley The people of Youngstown are no-nonsense. They look straight at you when they talk. Pride is evident in their eyes. There's a genuine humility. Pain, too. "Sometimes, it's hard to explain," said seventh-year Youngstown State football coach Jon Heacock, a native of nearby Alliance, Ohio. "But because of what's happened, the work ethic, it's different here than anywhere else. There is a purpose behind it all, and its monitored by the community. It forces you to live by a different set of standards." Yes, the stagnant Youngstown aura also gives its people life, an irony perhaps not lost on Bruce Springsteen, who sang about the town's sacrifices. He had plenty of material. Steel Valley, as its known here — Mahoning Valley, if you read the map — is a five-county area extending into western Pennsylvania. It is home to 700,000 people, mostly blue-collar. For much of the last century, the valley thrived as a hub of the steel industry. The mills attracted a diverse population. Bo Pelini's grandfather left Italy nearly 100 years ago to work the Canadian lumber camps. He soon moved to the coal mines in Pennsylvania, where Bo's father, Anthony, was born, and then to Youngstown for work in the steel mills. Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co., once synonymous with this city, served as the region's largest employer when its huge mill closed in 1977. That triggered a downturn of the U.S. steel industry. "Black Monday," as locals called the closure, was bad enough. When other mills faltered, Youngstown, a single-industry city, was devastated. Unemployment reached 30 percent. "The whole town was hit," Bo's father, Tony, said. "It didn't play any favorites." The elder Pelini sold pharmaceuticals. He and his wife, Mary Catherine — Mary Kay to friends and family — raised their eight children in a modest South Youngstown development. Many neighborhoods emptied. So many people moved to Columbus they joked the city at the center of the state ought to be renamed Youngstown. Today, abandoned storefronts near the old mills line streets that once bustled at the end of a work day. General Motors operates a huge plant not far away in Lordstown, but even its long-term survival is tenuous. Through the difficult times, though, something interesting happened. The people who stayed in Youngstown got even tougher. "I think there's a blessing in everything," Tony Pelini said. House on the corner Bo Pelini's 84-year-old father still lives in that same white, two-story house on the corner lot with the weathered basketball hoop in the driveway. Tony's oldest of five sons, Vince, returned as a business leader to Youngstown about five years ago. Vince Pelini's son, Mark, is the big defensive lineman at Mooney. Daughter Sarah is a senior at the school. She plays volleyball and basketball. Word is that Vince's next Mooney-bound child, Christine, an eighth-grade volleyball star, might be the family's best athlete since Bo. Vince witnessed the start of Youngstown's economic woes before leaving for Columbia University in 1978, where he was an all-Ivy League defensive back. "You had to be tough to go through what we did," said Congemi, the longtime Mooney assistant coach. "I think that was reflected in our style of football." Don Bucci-coached Mooney teams won big by running the ball and stopping the run. More than that, the athletes and coaches adopted the survival attitude of the city. "That's the never-quit mentality," said Heacock, the YSU coach. "It's never going to get bad enough that you would ever surrender here. You may go lose a game. You will never, ever quit at anything." Youngstown State won four national titles in Division I-AA under Jim Tressel, now at Ohio State. Bucci won four state championships at Cardinal Mooney before he retired in 1999 after 34 years. Fecko, the 33-year-old new coach, has won two more crowns in eight years. This season, Mooney lost for the first time in two years, a 28-27 stunner to Coldwater, Ohio, in the title game. The list of notable Steel Valley coaches is long. It includes Bob Stoops, his brothers Mike and Mark at Arizona; Bo Pelini and his older brother, Carl, the Nebraska defensive coordinator; Mark Mangino at Kansas; Carolina Panthers defensive coordinator Mike Trgovac; and Lou Holtz. Youngstown also produced former NFL stars Bernie Kosar and Michael Zordich, ex-Missouri quarterback Brad Smith, former Ohio State running back Maurice Clarett and Michigan receiver Mario Manningham. Mancini is one of five world champion boxers from the city. Jack Loew, a 1978 Mooney graduate with Bob Stoops and Vince Pelini, trains the latest champ, 25-year-old middleweight Kelly "the Ghost" Pavlik. Loew visits Oklahoma occasionally to see Stoops. The Sooners coach plans to attend Pavlik's next fight. At their core, the trainer said, Youngstown's boxers are no different from its coaches. "We're there to win," Loew said. If you get knocked down, Loew said, you get up, as Pavlik did before knocking out Jermain Taylor to end a September title bout in Atlantic City. "It's part of who they all are," Loew said. "They're fighters. Bobby goes down to Oklahoma. He has a bad first year, then he wins the national championship. Bo gets bounced out of Nebraska. He should have had the job four years ago. He digs and digs, and now he's back." Competitive fire Three weeks ago, just hours before Bo Pelini was introduced as the NU coach, John Murphy called his old Youngstown friend at home in Baton Rouge, La. Pelini's wife, Mary Pat, answered. Is Bo home? Murphy asked. He wanted to offer congratulations. "No," she said. "He's at church." Bo Pelini credits his parents, Tony and Mary Kay, for just about everything in his life. "Where I'm from," Bo Pelini said, "the parents have given a lot for their children. They sacrificed so their kids could have success. When you grow up that way, you learn about commitment, about discipline, about hard work." From his mother, it's clear what he learned. She was a devout Catholic until her death in 2001. She also passed along a fiery attitude. It's been nearly 20 years since Mary Kay discovered Bo and a few other groomsmen drinking beer and tossing a football around a gym inside the church before Carl Pelini's wedding. The priest had invited them inside, beer and all, because it was so hot in the parking lot. His invitation didn't matter to Mary Kay. She lit into those guys, putting an end to that game of catch in a second. The competitiveness? That came from mom, too. Her father and brother played professional baseball in the Cleveland Indians organization. Both were catchers. "My mom used to love sports," said Bo's brother Mike Pelini, a former Navy doctor who practices cardiology in Akron. "She was as competitive as anybody." Bo learned to compete against older kids at a young age. As the baby of the family, he had no choice. "He never wanted to take a back seat to anybody," Mike Pelini said. Murphy said Bo would "argue over a game of checkers." "And he was like that in the eighth grade." Budding star In the ninth grade, Bo bypassed freshman basketball, playing on the junior varsity and varsity teams. He went on to be a three-year starter. Carl, three grades ahead, asked his friends to watch out for little brother on the court and off. Nobody had to watch Bo. He was fine. "Even in sixth grade, he was as good or better than any of us," Murphy said. "You just looked at him and said, This guy is in sixth grade? The youngest Pelini was the first 1,000-point scorer in basketball at Mooney. He was the only athlete ever from the school to play in the Ohio North-South all-star game in football and basketball. Bo ran the option as a quarterback for Bucci and starred as a hard-hitting defensive back who often ignored the fundamentals of tacking early in his career. He started one season on offense as a senior in 1985. Mooney lost two games that year — the first to Cleveland St. Joseph, which featured future Heisman Trophy winner Desmond Howard and NFL quarterback Elvis Grbac, and then 6-0 to Galion in the state title game at Ohio Stadium in Columbus. On the first morning of recruiting that season, then-Ohio State coach Earle Bruce was waiting in Buccis office when the Mooney coach arrived. Pelini was Bruces first target, Bucci said. Pelini was an academic All-Big Ten pick three times as an OSU free safety. He earned co-captain status as a senior. The Buckeyes named him their most inspirational player. Then Pelini went right into coaching. He worked at Iowa as a graduate assistant and at Mooney under Bucci for one year before spending nine seasons in the NFL. That led to his gig as the Nebraska defensive coordinator in 2003, followed by one year under Bob Stoops at Oklahoma and three seasons at Louisiana State. Friends and family members say they expected Pelini's rise. "Obviously, we're very proud of him," Mike Pelini said. "But I would also say that none of us are surprised. It's been obvious for a long time that he was a natural leader." The Stoops influence Different organizations around Youngstown present awards for traits like courage, leadership and excellence. Most are named after one man: Ron Stoops. The father of Ron Jr., Bob, Mike and Mark, Stoops ranks right there with Tressel among the most respected coaching figures in this city's history. He is revered more, perhaps, than even Bucci. "After all these years," said his oldest son, Ron, "the legacy just continues to grow and be there. Many people have told me since hes passed how much he touched their lives. The amazing thing is that he was just an ordinary guy." Ron Stoops Sr. died doing what he loved, suffering a heart attack on the sideline Oct. 7, 1988, as Cardinal Mooney played Boardman High School. Ron Jr. was in the press box, a coach for the rival school. He rushed to the side of his father, whose life ended at 54 in an ambulance before he reached the hospital. Mooney's longtime defensive coordinator, Stoops worked at the school for 29 years. He coached his four sons and all five Pelini boys, all in a span of less than 10 years. The elder Stoops, in so many ways, served as the coaching model for that next generation. If there's one coach they emulate most, its Ron Stoops Sr. His football philosophy? "Spend a lot of time on the practice field," said Bucci, who won 284 games as Mooney's head coach. "Keep it as simple as possible. Don't outcoach yourself. Play great defense, and sooner or later you're going to win." Stoops sent his three youngest boys to play in the secondary at Iowa. They all coached as graduate assistants under Hayden Fry, just like Bo Pelini, before moving into bigger roles. Bob Stoops coached his first game at Oklahoma two days after he turned 40. Bo Pelini was hired at Nebraska 11 days before that same milestone birthday. Yet another Stoops Ron Jr., 50, snagged the best job of all — his dads. He coaches the Mooney defense, which includes his twin boys and Mark Pelini, Bo's nephew. And like his father, Ron Stoops doesn't want any other position. "I might have some doors open to me if I pursued them," Ron Jr. said. "But there's a price to pay for those big paychecks. It's never-ending for them." Ron Jr. described his late father as "very content in life." "It wasn't like the grass was always greener for him," Stoops said. "He wasn't in search of notoriety. After we'd win the conference title, everybody would be excited. But there he would be, collecting uniforms and sweeping the floor. "And then Saturday morning, he'd be back in there. That's what made him happy." Ron Stoops Sr. coached the defense every fall. In the winter, he scored basketball games. Spring was for baseball, his passion. In the summer, he painted houses to afford the Mooney tuition for his six children. He was also an athlete, playing three sports at Youngstown East and two sports at YSU. In college, Stoops played guard on the offensive and defensive lines. Dwight Beede, the Youngstown State coach in the late 1950s, had a rule about his linemen, according to Ken Brayer, a Stoops contemporary who worked as the YSU student manager. "(Beede) didn't want anybody playing on the line who was less than 175 pounds," Brayer said. "My job was to weigh the guys in. I always had to put 177, maybe right at 175. Ron never hit 150, but was as tough as could be." Stoops and his wife, Evelyn, raised their future coaches in a neighborhood about two miles from the Pelinis. Kids from several families would regularly meet at the city parks to compete in whatever game was on tap. Mark Pelini earned the nickname "Bo" at one of those parks. It came from Bo Scott, a former bruiser of a running back with the Cleveland Browns. Safe to say the name has stuck. "It was a simple life back then," Ron Stoops Jr. said. Still seems like it, sometimes. Every summer, the Stoops brothers return to Youngstown for a football camp at Mooney. Pelini comes, too. Mangino, raised in New Castle, Pa., often attends. Tressel was the featured speaker in 2006. While at home, the coaches participate in a day-long bocce tournament at Casseses MVR, the Italian eatery that serves as something of a tribute to Youngstown's coaching heritage. A trophy case inside the restaurant holds a collection of football helmets. The white one with a red "N" on the side, as of this month, reclaimed a spot. And, oh, by the way, there exists one more Ron Stoops in this coaching family. The oldest son of Ron Jr., he graduated from Mooney in 2004 and signed as a safety to play at Michigan State. A heart condition cut short his career before Ron could play a collegiate game. So now he's at Ohio State, scheduled to graduate next summer. Tressel put the youngest Stoops coach to work as a student assistant. Maybe the kid has a future in the business. Ties that bind Bucci, the 74-year-old retired coach, said he understands Nebraskans' connection with Bo Pelini. "I think the people in Nebraska are so used to Tom Osborne," Bucci said, "not only his success but his way of doing it. I think they equate that type of coaching with Bo. And they're right." Bucci grew up in Youngstown. He went to East High with Ron Stoops Sr. and played football at Notre Dame. He still works every day as athletic director at Cardinal Mooney, his office tucked away on the lower level with dozens of pictures and plaques on every wall. Enrollment at the school has dropped from approximately 2,000 in its heyday a decade after it opened in 1956 to today's 615. Mooney competes in the fourth-largest class in Ohio but regularly beats the big schools from Cleveland and Columbus. The people here stick together. Mooney graduates marry Mooney graduates. Bo Pelini did. So did his brother Vince. Mooney grads also look out for each other. Bob Stoops recently helped lead an effort to replace the grass practice field behind the school. So now, Mooney practices on an artificial surface adorned at the 50-yard line and in the end zones with New Orleans Saints logos. The field came straight from the Superdome. And don't be surprised, people at Mooney say, if that last spot on the NU coaching staff is reserved for Kansas assistant Tim Beck, another Mooney graduate. "Mooney's a unique place," said Fecko, the current coach. "Alumni who leave always come back. I know there are a lot of places around here where that's not necessarily the case. All of us are united in different ways." When Youngstown families fought simply to survive, Bucci and Stoops provided structure. Those who refused to waver were rewarded. Bo Pelini, you see, is a product of all this. He couldn't change if he wanted. Just like the rest of them, Bucci said, Pelini is a taskmaster. "A lot of these coaches feel that in 2007, you've got to really loosen things up," the old coach said. "I'm not saying the kids shouldn't have fun. "They'll have fun in winning."
Northeast Ohio is football's Garden of Eden.....from the beginning to the present, the number of players, coaches and legends it produces is extraordinary. It is a religion unto itself in that region and has been for generations.....it is no coincidence that the Hall of Fame is located in Canton and that our Buckeyes have a heritage in which we take immense pride.
Great story, AJ. I learned a lot from it. I gained respect for the Stoops and Pelini families. Thanks.
When it comes to football, where does Western PA end and Northeast OH begin? If that isn't the motherlode, I don't know what is. OT, but hey Buck-T. Heard of Sal Mosca?
You're right about that BDR...same guys separated by only an arbitrary line drawn on a piece of paper/map. Tough, hard-nosed, proud heritage where football is a way of life and they breed players by the ton. Never heard of Sal Mosca, do tell......
He's a jazz pianist that recently passed. He never recorded much, preferring to teach and "practice" with several legendary players. His recordings were few and can be a bit pricey, but his playing is amazing. Click on the picture below, then scroll down to listen to samples if you want.
So did Sal play high school football in W.Pa/NE Ohio or go to school at Cardinal Mooney, before he became a Jazz guy? 8)