STARKVILLE — Mississippi State University lost one of its favorite graduates Tuesday when former football letterman and National Football League veteran Kent Hull died Tuesday afternoon.
School officials announced Hull’s death, but the cause wasn’t known. Funeral arrangements haven’t been announced.
Hull, a lettermen from 1979-82 as a center on the MSU football team, played three seasons with the New Jersey Generals of the United States Football League before spending the next 11 seasons with the NFL’s Buffalo Bills.
Hull, a Pontotoc native who grew up in Greenwood, was described by everyone who knew him as someone whose personality was suited to play on the offensive line because he was a protector of people.
“We called him big ‘un, and he was always there to take care of you when and if you needed it,” said John Bond, Hull’s MSU teammate from 1980-82. “He was my brother and somebody I could always count on for the 30 years I’ve known him.”
Hull, 50, anchored the line in arguably the most memorable football game in MSU history, a 6-3 victory against top-ranked Alabama in 1980. Bond, the quarterback for the final three years of Hull’s MSU career, remembers how his then 250-pound teammate protected him before, during, and after the famous upset.
“I had gotten into a little scuffle before the Alabama game and had messed up my finger and Kent was the one who was the one saying, ‘Now J.B., you can’t be doing this kind of stuff before a big game like
this,’ ” Bond said. “He was always looking out for me and for everybody else.”
When it was clear Bond might need medical attention for his throwing hand, Hull did what any offensive lineman would do for his quarterback: He protected him.
“I didn’t think anything of it and told him I’d get a few stitches, but he said to me, ‘J.B., if you get stitches then you can’t play,” Bond said. “I told him, ‘All right. I’ll wrap it up’, and Kent made sure I was protected to play in that game with a finger that had the skin flapping around the bone.”
After the upset in Jackson, Hull had to come clean about his teammate’s injury because the evidence was all over his uniform.
“Well, Kent had blood from his butt down to his ankles and we get in the locker room all excited and everybody wants to know what happened to him,” Bond said. “He finally had to say, ‘It ain’t my blood. It’s J.B.’s.”
MSU earned a trip to the Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas, at the end of the 1980 season but lost to the University of Nebraska 31-17.
After leaving MSU, Hull played in 189 games, including 121 in a row, for the Buffalo Bills from 1986-96. He helped the Bills win four consecutive AFC Championships (1990-93) and started in four straight Super Bowls.
“Words fall short when the pain runs so deep,” Bills Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly said in a statement released by the team. “I’m finding it hard to describe what this loss means to me and my family. Kent Hull was my best friend, a man of great courage, faith, and character. He will be missed and never forgotten.”
Hull was named to the Pro Bowl in 1988-90), and his name went up on the Bills Wall of Fame at Ralph Wilson Stadium in 2002.
Hull was inducted into MSU’s sports hall of fame in 2000, and the state’s sports hall of fame three years later.
“I’m so, so saddened,” Buffalo Hall of Fame coach Marv Levy told The Associated Press. “I coached for 47 years, and he was one of the very most memorable individuals who was my privilege to coach.”
Throughout his time in the NFL, Hull stayed true to his roots near the people who loved and cherished him in the Magnolia State. He kept a
350-acre family farm in Greenwood where his wife, Kay, and two children, Drew and Ellen, settled.
“When my son died, he drove nine hours for his funeral and turned around and drove nine hours back that same day,” Bond said. “Without a doubt, he was just that kind of guy. Sure, he loved football but he loved people more.”
After his playing career, Hull organized bringing professional athletes and other celebrities to Mississippi each year for a golf tournament in his name to raise money for the Blair E. Batson Hospital for Children at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.
“Kent was a great representative of Mississippi State University and not just on the playing field,” Mississippi State Director of Athletics Scott Stricklin said. “I know a lot of people benefited from his foundation and generosity once he left his playing days behind him. His warm personality made you feel good after you got to talk with him.”
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