Former Memphis AD, assistant coach Bob Patterson dies

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) Bob Patterson, a former Memphis athletic director and assistant football coach, has died. He was 84. Yvonne Savage, an administrative

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) Bob Patterson, a former Memphis athletic director and assistant football coach, has died. He was 84.

Yvonne Savage, an administrative assistant at Twin Oaks Memorial Gardens and Funeral Home in Southaven, Mississippi, said Tuesday that Patterson died Monday at Methodist Hospice in Memphis.

Patterson was Memphis' athletic director and an assistant football coach from 1981-82. He also played for Memphis, then known as Memphis State, in 1953 and 1954.

Patterson was an assistant coach at Southwestern Louisiana, Texas Tech and Vanderbilt before returning to Memphis in 1981.

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He also was a defensive line coach for the United States Football League's Memphis Showboats before retiring from coaching in 1986. He later was a part-time scout.

Patterson, a New Jersey native, was inducted into the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame in 2003.

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