Joe Paterno

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Brooklyn, New York

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Quarterback

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Deceased

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White

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American Football

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Joseph Vincent Paterno (/pəˈtɜːrnoʊ/; December 21, 1926 – January 22, 2012), sometimes referred to as JoePa, was an American college football player, athletic director, and coach. He was the head coach of the Penn State Nittany Lions from 1966 to 2011. With 409 victories, Paterno is the most victorious coach in NCAA FBS history. He recorded his 409th victory on October 29, 2011; his career ended with his dismissal from the team on November 9, 2011, as a result of the Penn State child sex abuse scandal. He died 74 days later, of complications from lung cancer.

Paterno was born in Brooklyn, New York. He attended Brown University, where he played football both ways as the quarterback and a cornerback. He had originally planned on going to law school, but he was instead hired in 1950 as an assistant football coach at Penn State. He was persuaded to do this by his college coach Rip Engle, who had taken over as Penn State's head coach. In 1966, Paterno was named as Engle's successor. He soon coached the team to two undefeated regular seasons in 1968 and 1969. The team won two national championships—in 1982 and 1986. Paterno coached five undefeated teams that won major bowl games, and in 2007 he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach. During his career, he led the Nittany Lions to 37 bowl appearances with 24 wins while turning down offers to coach National Football League (NFL) teams that included the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New England Patriots.

Paterno's coaching career ended abruptly in 2011, shortly before his death, when the Penn State Board of Trustees terminated his contract in response to a child sex abuse scandal involving Paterno's former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky. An investigation conducted by former FBI director Louis Freeh reported that Paterno concealed information relating to Sandusky's abuse of a young boy. A critique of the Freeh report, commissioned by the Paterno family, disputed Paterno's involvement in the alleged cover-up. NBC sportscaster Bob Costas said that Freeh not only gathered facts, "but he reached a conclusion which is at least debatable from those facts and then he assigned ... a very dark motivation to Joe Paterno, which seems like it might be quite a leap."

In 2012, the NCAA vacated all of Penn State's wins from 1998 through 2011 as part of its punishment. State Senator Jake Corman used the Freeh report as a basis to sue the NCAA, asserting that both Freeh and the NCAA had collaborated and failed to follow due process. Corman released emails showing "regular and substantive" contact between NCAA officials and Freeh's investigators, suggesting that Freeh's conclusions were orchestrated. In a 2015 legal settlement with Penn State, the NCAA reversed its decision and restored all 111 wins to Paterno's record.

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