Livengood looks back at his Everett years

Published 9:02 am Tuesday, May 25, 2010

The way Jim Livengood sees it, just about everything that has happened in his athletic and professional career can be charted back to the two years he spent at Everett Junior College.

But his tenures as a BYU quarterback and as athletic director at Washington State, Southern Illinois, Arizona and UNLV have nothing on the most important connection he made while in Everett.

That would be the pretty girl with the red tennis shoes whom he first noticed in badminton class.

Linda Kuchera, who was part of football star Dennis Erickson’s graduating class at Everett High School before attending EJC, went on to become Linda Livengood.

Jim Livengood, who will be keynote speaker and one of 10 members enshrined in the 2010 Hall of Fame class at the school now known as Everett Community College on Wednesday night, has plenty of great memories of the two years he spent attending college in Snohomish County.

“Everett JC has a lot of special things to me,” he said, “none more than meeting my bride and the mother of my two kids.”

His wife of 42 years was not the only connection Livengood made while attending EJC in 1964 and 1965. He spent one year splitting time at quarterback with a man named Mike Price, whom Livengood would go on to hire as the WSU football coach while serving as athletic director there in 1989. He also got to know Erickson through Linda, starting off a relationship that continued through Livengood’s and Erickson’s first two years as AD and coach, respectively, at WSU.

And Livengood might also have had a hand in WSU landing star quarterback Timm Rosenbach, whose father, Lynn, was Livengood’s head coach at Quincy High School before taking a job as an assistant coach at EJC and bringing his quarterback with him.

“It’s a small family, when you think about it,” Livengood said of the never-ending ties that developed at EJC.

Livengood spent six years as WSU’s athletic director before taking the same position at Arizona in 1994. His tenure at U of A lasted 16 years and saw the Wildcats win 11 national titles in various sports.

But in December, amid talk that his expiring contract would not be renewed, Livengood left Arizona. He’s excited about his new position as AD at UNLV, a once-proud athletic department that has often struggled to find its niche in the entertainment glut that is Las Vegas.

“What we need to do is create the atmosphere of 20 years ago, when (men’s basketball powerhouse) the Runnin’ Rebels were here,” said Livengood, whose first job as an AD came as the man who ran the Southern Illinois athletic department between Gale Sayers and former NFL quarterback Jim Hart. “This community is an interesting community; there are a lot of people from other places, and this is the only four-year school in town.

“In the ’90s, when the Runnin’ Rebels were doing what they were doing, you couldn’t get a ticket — no matter how many casinos you owned. So it’s been done before, and it’s something we hope to bring back here.”

Livengood has forged quite a career in athletics over the years, but none of it can compare to his ability to get a date with the girl with the red tennis shoes.

His first college choice certainly brought plenty of rewards. And he’s honored to be brought back for this week’s event.

“It’s an incredible honor,” Livengood said of being inducted in a class that also includes athletes Mary Ann Bowman, Pat Brady, Eugene Cummings, Vicki Foltz and Steve Okoniewski, coaches Marv Cross, Will McGillivray and Bill Deller and the 1952 EJC football team. “It’s going to be nostalgic.

“Anything I’ve been able to do in my career, I have to look back on EJC for giving me my start.”