:: 5th Quarter ::

A RECAP FOR EVERYONE

WHO JUST COULD NOT MAKE IT and...FOR THOSE WHO DID

Reunions are a way for us all to celebrate our connections and roots. It allows us to honor our elders who we realize have been influential in the lives we've lived. Reunions also allow us to rediscover connections to those individuals we struggled with towards a noble cause, ...and...reunions are fun!

This year 2016 we honored all of the football Captains on all of the Kingsmen teams that we all looked up to and looked to for their leadership and their grit.

HERE THEN IS HOW THE WEEKEND WENT

On Friday night, Bob and Laura Davis again opened up their beautiful home for a BBQ in their back yard. There was no charge and the BBQ food and drinks were outstanding. The weather was perfect and everybody was tuned up for the weekend..

On Saturday morning we were again treated to Bob Shoup's very own special "Breakfast of Champions" where he invites speakers who have shown early on as players that they do understand football and have gone on to apply this in coaching or some other professional venue with distinction..

Our speaker this year was Timothy C. Hengst who graduated from Cal Lutheran (then CLC) in 1972 as an art major and was a starter at right tackle on the 1971 NAIA football championship team, one of his fondest memories.

He was accepted into John Hopkins University School of Medicine directly after graduating from Cal Lutheran from where he received his graduate degree in medical and biological illustration, after which he illustrated for Dr. Denton Colley at the Texas Heart Institute and served as Director of Photography and Audiovisual Communications. He joined the faculty in the graduate program at Johns Hopkins and served as production manager in the graphics and illustration division and assistant professor in the graduate program. He was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of Medical Illustrators

In so many ways, Tim Hengst has truly proven himself to be worthy of being called "a Kingsmen". He has served on the CLU sports Hall of Fame founding committee, the Alumni Board and Board of Regents, been a full time faculty member since 2001 in Multimedia, was Interim Dean of the College 2005-07 and is Executive Director of the Kingsmen

Shakespeare Festival, Chair of the Faculty, faculty mentor for CLU's golf and women’s volleyball teams, a.Freshmen
Seminar Advisor, and member of the Victory Club. Tim also was rated 97.5% out of 5 points in student evaluations of him and his teaching and mentoring work at CLU...which is...an A+ rating. When Tim was once asked what was the most important thing in his life, he answered, "God, with my wife Jeanne a very close second

TIM'S WORDS AND THOUGHTS:

“What a privilege and honor to be a part of Cal Lutheran celebrating two team national championships 4 decades apart, one as a player in football and one as team faculty mentor in volleyball. Playing offensive tackle (no we didn't have any 300 pounders back then) was the final culmination of eight years of high school and college football”.

Oh what memories. Mountclef flyers in full pads, board drills, straddling a plank and charging head on to an oncoming defensive lineman, three-a-day practices during hell week!

Tim shared comments about his career by focusing on five main thoughts: Teamwork, opportunities taken or missed, reaching for new heights, acknowledging others and working hard / playing hard.

Hengst started with a quick review of his career:
Four years of football at Cal Lutheran with total of one loss and three ties. Two undefeated Knave teams and the rest as a two tear starter at offensive tackle for the Kingsmen. Senior year with a pregnant wife during the season along with Mike Hunkins. Montana Tech story with Ross Porter, Mr. Heater meet Mr. Sam Cvijanovich.

Graduate school at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Driving through Texas with a 4 month old, saying "Well that's one state we'll never live in!" Surviving classes at the top med school in the country. Leaving Baltimore saying, "We're never coming back here again!"

First job at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston, TEXAS, 1974! Cool job hanging out with oil barons, dignitaries from around the world coming to be treated by Dr. Denton Cooley. Thinking $11,000 a year was amazing! Spending hours every day in surgery watching, sketching and illustrating Cooley’s procedures. Only in Texas do you have cows in the hospital!

Getting a call from Johns Hopkins asking me to come back to Baltimore and join the grad faculty. BALTIMORE? Teaching in their grad program and illustrating a dozen books on ophthalmological surgery.

Getting homesick for So Cal after 15 years, 2 children, another on the way, and a call from Jerry Halweg with an exciting offer to get back to CA, coinciding with an offer to illustrate a 3 volume text for a former Hopkins colleague at USC. Back to CA and of course, Thousand Oaks!

Working in marketing, editor and publications for the Ceramic Tile Institute and pursuing my medical illustration career as a freelancer. Working as a self-employed person for 10 years until I received a call from CLU to fill in for a sick professor and the rest is Cal Lutheran history since 2001. Director of Multimedia, Interim Dean of the College, Faculty Chair, Executive Director of the Kingsmen Shakespeare Company, Faculty mentor to golf and Volleyball, Continue active career in medical illustration, Given lifetime award from AMI.

Work hard / play hard - gives meaning to life.

The Breakfast of Champions has always had a tradition of honoring the women in our lives, and this year we were given the privilege of hearing from Kellee Roesel, CLU's Head Coach of the Women's National Volleyball Championship Team and Melissa Maxwell-Doherty, Vice President of Mission and Identity and former Campus Pastor. The rest of the women attending continued to turn heads through their presence and representation and grace.

Of the various participants this year, two foursomes stand out from all others. The first group was Mike Sheppard, Lynn Thompson, J.C. Benedict and Rodger Young.

The second group included Gary McGinnis, Matt McGinnis, Rob Taschereau and Tim Hengst.

At the end of the day it was unanimous amongst all of the golfers that there was only one word that truly explained the reason why each of them had a good time, but did not achieve their objective... and that word is..

This year's Reunion Banquet confirmed in a very strong way what all of us have known and experienced through our football experience at Cal Lutheran, through the coaches and teammates that added so much to making our lives what they have become, and to our University and CLU community that we are thankful for and whose mission we support.

Our Program for the Evening
(click on it open and turn the pages)

The Los Robles Country Club setting was spectacular, the Hawaiian theme was very well received, not only through the delicious buffet, but through the Hawaiian Leis that were flown in for the occasion that just put everyone ,,,"in the mood".

Our guest speaker for the evening was Steve Bogan, who grew up as a Lutheran and received a Bachelor of Arts in History Magna Cum Laude and played football under Coach Shoup at California Lutheran College. He received his Masters Degree in theology from Fuller Theological Seminary and then went on to pursue 30 years of teaching in Comparative Religions, History, Economics and American Government.

He is also a very successful high school football coach, serving over 20 years as a head coach. His teams have won 11 league championships and made 5 trips to the Southern California CIF finals winning four of the five championship contests. His players have gone on to play at every level of post high school football, including the Big Sky, Mountain West, Pack 12 and the NFL.

He is very insightful and a great mentor to young people in understanding how important Christian values are in modeling a successful life.

Steve Bogan’s main points were that Cal Lutheran and Cal Lutheran Football, besides his family, were major influences in his life, not minor or even moderate ones.

But the key thing he learned, or better said, "he caught" was an "attitude" or approach that rubbed off on all of us who played at The Lu. The coaching staff seemed to possess it, and we as players sensed it. There was a "cut loose, get after it, never quit, and have fun" environment that after many decades modern scholarship is now articulating in words that those who played at “The Lu” knew many years ago. In fact, the “Parable of the Talents” reflects this truth; the truth that effort trumps outcome in God's eyes ... so enjoy giving effort. At Cal Lutheran, we learned to play with "passion and perseverance”. We learned to play with grit: the most important virtue a person needs to make it in this world. It's hard to learn "grit" in a math course, science lab, or literature class. You can learn it a little, but not much. You learn true "grit" on the gridiron, in the world of competition ... in environments where "passion and perseverance" are tested yet encouraged at the same time. Ironically, the first thing the academic world tends to cut during tough economic times, are the very things that inculcate best, the most important virtues needed to make it, and excel, in this world ... again "grit."

Bogan is so thankful, that Cal Lutheran was a place that understood that "learning takes place everywhere" and supported competitive endeavors such as athletics. It is Steve’s prayer that Cal Lu would be a place that continues to encourage its students to get involved in the co-curricular opportunities that help them develop a "never say quit" ... "One will find a way" attitude towards life. Because, at the end of the day, it's "our attitude, more than our aptitude, that determines our altitude, with some intestinal fortitude."

HERE IS WHAT WAS REPRESENTATIVE ABOUT THE REUNION

One of Cal Lutheran's very first players from the early years was
David Regalado, a fullback that achieved great things on the gridiron. We was not only a Team Captain, but was awarded to the NAIA DISTRICT III FIRST TEAM OFFENSE; HONARABLE MENTION, NAIA ALL-AMERICAN; HONORABLE MENTION, LITTLE COAST; ALL-LUTHERAN FIRST TEAM DEFENSE.

Dr. Jim Kallas, running back's Coach in the early years had a special bond with Davey, perhaps because Kallas in his collegiate years was renowned as "the Galloping Greek", a devastating runner. The two saw each other, they embraced each other and in one instant the Reunion was defined.

THE FIGHTING HEART AWARD TO DANIEL RAMSEY
The Reunion acknowledged the "Fighting Heart" of one of its own in
Dan Ramsey, CLU '75, who was awarded with the Davey Spurlock Fighting Heart Award

Daniel Lee Ramsey is one of those very exceptional people we all meet in life that set their own boundaries in pursuing their dreams and finding their purpose, even when major obstacles are placed in their path. His achievements are many, from his musical abilities following his father's tutoring, from being elected Study Body President at CLU by his classmates, to receiving the Most Valuable Player Football Award in high school as a halfback and being a productive member of Cal Lutheran's NAIA 1972 Championship team as a halfback, kicker and special team's punt return specialist, to numerous involvements in support of the communities in which he has lived with his wife, Sheri, and his five children. Dan Ramsey is and always will be...a Kingsmen.

In 2008, Dan suffered a devastating stroke at the age of 56. He did not crumble in despondency, but picked himself up and has amazingly continued to productively support the community in which he lives, Cal Lutheran University, Kingsmen football and the 5th Quarter Alumni Football Club.