Bobby Keasler, the former McNeese State and Louisiana-Monroe football coach who guided teams to multiple conference championships and a national title game appearance, has died at age 80.
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McNeese State spokesman Matthew Bonnette said Keasler died Tuesday night in Lake Charles, Louisiana, where he had lived since retiring from coaching roughly two decades ago.
Keasler is best remembered for his successful nine-year run at McNeese State University, where he became one of the winningest coaches in program history.
Hired in 1990, Keasler led the Cowboys to four Southland Conference championships and seven appearances in the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs. His 1995 team finished the regular season undefeated and reached No. 1 in the national rankings before losing to Marshall University in the national semifinals.
Two years later, McNeese advanced to the FCS national championship game before falling to Youngstown State University.
Keasler compiled a 78-34-2 record at McNeese and was named Southland Conference Coach of the Year five times.
In 1999, he accepted the head coaching position at University of Louisiana at Monroe, which was still relatively new to the Football Bowl Subdivision level at the time. He coached the Warhawks for four seasons, finishing with an 8-28 record before stepping down early in the 2002 season.
Before entering the college ranks, Keasler coached high school football in his hometown of New Iberia, Louisiana. He later joined Northeast Louisiana, now Louisiana-Monroe, as an assistant coach in 1981.
Keasler received numerous honors following his coaching career. He was inducted into the McNeese Hall of Fame in 2006 and entered the Southland Conference Hall of Honor in 2014. A year earlier, he had been named the Southland Conference Coach of the Decade for the 1990s.
Funeral arrangements have not yet been announced.
