INSPIRING LEGACIES
Remembering two south dakota Greats
beanie cooper
Former South Dakota football coach and athletic director Bernard “Beanie” Cooper passed away on April 20 in Sioux City at the age of 86. Cooper coached Coyote football from 1975-1978, leading the Coyotes to the 1978 North Central Conference title. He was 18-24 in his four years at the helm of the football program. Cooper took the head coaching spot at USD after the departure of Joe Salem in 1974. Cooper also became athletic director for USD during the summer of 1976, holding that position until 1981. He oversaw the Coyotes’ move into the DakotaDome and helped advance women’s athletics at USD, including overseeing the creation of the softball program in 1978.
Jack Doyle
Former University of South Dakota men’s basketball coach and athletic director Jack Doyle passed away September 6 at the age of 80. Doyle joined the USD athletic department in 1971 following 14 seasons in the South Dakota high school ranks. He served as an assistant men’s basketball coach under Bob Mulcahy for two seasons before being named Mulcahy’s successor in 1973. Doyle coached for nine seasons, leading the Coyotes to a 106-119 record. His 106 wins are the fourth-most in program history.
Doyle resigned from his head coaching position in March of 1982 to become USD’s athletic director, a position he served in for 15 years before retiring in 1998. Under Doyle’s leadership, USD won 21 North Central Conference championships in various sports. In addition, he initiated numerous upgrades to the DakotaDome, including an eight-lane, 200-meter track, a new Daktronics custom Cooper graduated from Morningside College with a degree in accounting in 1953. He began coaching football in 1958, coming to USD after successful stops scoreboard and artificial turf for football. at Algona Bishop Garrigan (1958-68) and Sioux City Heelan (1969-74) in Iowa. He also served as athletic director for Heelan during his time there, and finished In May of 1999, Doyle received the NCC Honor Award. He was inducted into the Coyote Sports Hall of Fame in 2002 and into with a high school football record of 92-38-2. the NACDA Hall of Fame in 2006. After leaving USD, Cooper became athletic director at Indiana State in 1981 and During his successful tenure in the high school ranks, Doyle was chairman for the NCAA Division I-AA football committee for much of the compiled a 72-37 record at Lead (1966-71) after coaching Faith 1980s. He retired from athletics in 1990. to a conference championship during his stay there (1957-60). Doyle’s teams at Lead won or shared the Black Hills Conference Cooper is survived by his wife of 63 years, Ruby, as well as seven children, 24 title five times in six seasons. grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren. 22 2013-14 ANNUAL REPORT “We lost a great Coyote this weekend in Beanie Cooper,” said USD athletic director David Herbster. “Beanie was part of a transformational time at USD and his legacy will live on here in the players he coached and the lives he touched.”