Dick Hoak, the versatile former Penn State running back, quarterback and defensive back whose college career foreshadowed a long and distinguished NFL life, died Wednesday at age 86.
A product of Jeannette High School who lettered for the Nittany Lions under Rip Engle from 1958 to 1960, Hoak embodied the toughness and multi-position reliability that defined that era of Penn State football.
In Happy Valley, Hoak played halfback and safety as a sophomore, continued primarily as a running back as a junior, and handled quarterback duties along with safety by his senior year.
Over three varsity seasons he rushed for 767 yards and eight touchdowns while completing better than half of his passes and adding more than 250 receiving yards.
The 1959 Nittany Lions reached the first Liberty Bowl and blanked Alabama 7-0. A year later, Hoak starred in Penn State’s 41-12 victory over Oregon in the 1960 Liberty Bowl.
He ran for two touchdowns, threw for two more, and intercepted two passes, earning game MVP honors. Teammates and the Penn State Quarterback Club named him the team’s most valuable player as a senior.
Those performances helped set the stage for his professional career.
Selected by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the seventh round of the 1961 NFL Draft, Hoak spent a decade as a running back for the team, earning a Pro Bowl selection in 1968 and finishing with 3,965 rushing yards.
After retiring as a player, he returned to the Steelers as an assistant in 1972 and remained for 35 seasons as running backs coach under Chuck Noll and Bill Cowher.
He was part of five Super Bowl championship teams and coached Hall of Famers Franco Harris and Jerome Bettis.
Steelers president Art Rooney II described him as “part of the foundation of this organization” whose “toughness, loyalty, dedication and unwavering commitment” spanned generations.
For Penn State followers, Hoak’s story remains rooted in the late 1950s and early 1960s in State College—the bowl heroics, the position flexibility, and the quiet leadership that earned him team MVP honors.
He graduated in 1961 with a degree in social studies. His subsequent loyalty to the Steelers, including declining other coaching opportunities, mirrored the program values he absorbed under Engle.
Hoak was later inducted into the Steelers Hall of Honor and received the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s Award of Excellence in 2025.
The Nittany Lion community remembers him as one of its own: a Pennsylvania native who thrived in Happy Valley before carrying those traits into a 45-year association with the Steelers as both player and coach.
