It seems as if a guy who rushed for 431 yards and three touchdowns and averaged 4.5 yards per carry for Kansas University as a senior ought to be asked about his own running prowess at least once every half-century. Ron Oelschlager isn’t holding his breath waiting for that to happen.
Fifty years ago, he was the guy blocking for the guy everybody wanted to watch. Today, he’s the grandfather of the KU running back in the news, former Free State High star quarterback/safety Joe Dineen.
I wanted grandpa’s take on Dineen’s potential as a running back, so I asked if he thought the teenager could become as good at the position as he was.
After he stopped laughing, Oelschlager said, “Oh yeah, easy. Can he get in a three-point stance and stick his head into some tackle’s side?”
The numbers say Oelschlager was a much better running back than he paints himself as, but nobody could ever say he was KU’s best at the time. Not even close. He shared the backfield with classmate Gale Sayers.
“If I was ever any good at running back, it was because they were scared to death of Sayers,” Oelschlager said. “If I went on (to professional football), my position was going to be cornerback.”
Like Sayers, Oelschlager played for KU from 1962-64. In comparing himself to Sayers, he said, “it was kind of like being in a race, having a flat tire and falling two or three laps behind.”
Back then, Oelschlager was a two-way player, much as his grandson was for Free State. Dineen played running back and safety as a junior and was the Kansas Gatorade Player of the Year as a senior, when he doubled as quarterback and safety for the Firebirds.
Recruited to Kansas as a safety with the potential to be switched to linebacker, Dineen was recruited by Rice to play on the other side of the ball. The Rice assistant coach in charge of recruiting Dineen was none other than KU’s current offensive coordinator and offensive line coach, John Reagan. After season-ending injuries to Brandon Bourbon and Taylor Cox, Dineen was stolen from Clint Bowen’s defense to contribute to Reagan’s offense earlier this week. Dineen’s family ties to KU football run much deeper than his grandfather having played there. Reagan, Oelschlager said, was close friends with Dineen’s dad, Joe Dineen Sr., going back to Reagan’s days as an assistant on Mark Mangino’s staff. Oelschlager’s son, Ron Jr., and Bowen, KU’s defensive coordinator, stood up in each other’s weddings.
“I was really surprised to hear about him moving to running back,” Oelschlager said, but the thought of him switching to offense crossed Oelschlager’s mind, he said, when Charlie Weis added Reagan to his staff.
Oelschlager’s proud of his grandson, but was father to too many college athletes to grow giddy about it. His son, an all-state quarterback at Lawrence High, played baseball on scholarship at Arizona. Daughters Jill and Jodi played for three state-champion volleyball teams and one state-champion basketball team for LHS and played volleyball in college. Jill played at Iowa, Jodi, Dineen’s mom, at KU.
Dineen last played running back as a junior in high school, when he averaged 6.8 yards on 87 carries and ran for 10 touchdowns. His grandfather and the rest of the family will watch with pride when No. 29 gets into games, but they won’t put pressure on him to become the next Gale Sayers.
The next Gale Sayers already played for Oklahoma State and his name was Barry Sanders. The first Joe Dineen is all anybody expects.
