Mike White, former Cal, Illinois and Raiders coach, dies at 89

Key Highlights

• Louis Rams when they won the Super Bowl following the 1999 season.“Mike was special,” said Burl Toler Jr., a linebacker who played at Cal under White from 1974-77.
• “He treated us like men and with a lot of respect.
• Mike was a very gifted and smart coach who loved Cal and loved being a coach, and he surrounded himself with a lot of like minds who instilled in us a will to succeed.”White was a four-sport student-athlete at Cal in the 1950s and spent time as an assistant with the Bears and at rival Stanford before getting the head coaching job at his alma mater in 1972. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementWhite had a 35-30-1 record in six seasons at Cal, with his biggest success coming in 1975 when he was named coach of the year after the Bears finished tied with UCLA for first place in the conference.
• Cal finished 14th in the nation with an offense that featured Chuck Muncie and quarterback Joe Roth. White also coached quarterback Steve Bartkowski earlier at Cal and helped develop him into the No.
• 1 overall pick in the 1975 NFL draft. He then left for the NFL, spending two seasons as an offensive line coach for the 49ers, before returning to college in 1980 with Illinois.