Gainesville — As a Gainesville High School freshman in 1955, Sam Nichols had made up his mind he was done with football.

At about 120 pounds, he figured he was too small for the sport and probably better suited for baseball. So he made up his mind he was going to quit.

When his coach heard the news, he sat down next to Nichols and offered him some advice — advice that would not only convince him to stick with football, but would help to foster an attitude that Nichols would carry with him for at least the next 50 years.

“Sam,” said his coach, “If you start quitting, you’ll be a quitter for the rest of your life.”

“I never forgot that conversation,” Nichols said.

Although former GHS football coach Buddy Ryan’s stint in Gainesville lasted a mere three years before work brought him to other campuses and eventually the NFL, its impact for Nichols and his teammates is, about five decades later, still indelible.

And if it’s any indication of the impact his players had on him as well, Ryan will return to Gainesville this week in honor of the Class of 1960’s 50-year reunion.

Raised in Frederick, Okla., Ryan began his coaching career in Gainesville in the fall of 1957 as an assistant football coach. He would become the head coach in 1959.

While on the field he had a way of inspiring confidence in his players, convincing them they were capable of anything and pushing them hard enough until they believed it.

“To tell you he had an impact and he made a difference is probably an understatement,” said Larry Sullivant, who remembers playing under Ryan before graduating in 1959. “There are probably hundreds of men out there that played ball for Buddy Ryan that are better men than they would have been had they not had Buddy Ryan in their life.”

Sullivant remembers himself as a high school student, asking Ryan if there was anyway he thought he could get a football scholarship.

“He said ‘Sully, you can do anything you think you can do’,” he recalled.

Ryan told him to drive to his campus of choice and tell the coach to bring out the toughest man on his team.

“When you whip his butt,” Ryan told Sullivant, “They’ll give you a scholarship.”

Sullivant started at University of North Texas the next year.

And although it’s been 50 years since Sullivant played high school ball, he still remembers Ryan as an intense coach.

During practices, Sullivant said Ryan would come up to him and say his opposition thought he could take Sullivant down. Little did he know, Ryan had said the same thing to Sullivant’s opposition.

“When he walked on the field, that’s what he wanted you to believe, that nobody could whip you, that you were the very best,” Sullivant said.

Perhaps it was this belief that fostered Ryan’s novel approach to defense, something he eventually took with him to the pros.

“He always said if the other team can’t score, they can’t beat you,” Sullivant said.

Nichols, who played quarterback and halfback, remembers Ryan’s philosophy was always “meet at the quarterback,” a rare move during the time.

“He taught the NFL how to have an attack defense,” Sullivant said. “That’s his legacy to the NFL.”

But defensive strategies weren’t the only trait that would follow Ryan to the NFL.

“Everyone that had heart was special to him,” Sullivant said. “He carried that all the way into the pros.”

Teammate Doug Lillard remembers that Ryan’s firm style of coaching could make a compliment seem like a million bucks.

 “He was such a disciplinarian that when he decided to pat you on the back it was something special, and you lived for that pat,” he said.

Walking down the hall, Lillard said the key was to avoid the head coach, Dub Wooten, who most players considered to be more straight-laced. But when a player saw Ryan, he would want to say “hi,” if only for the confidence boost.

“He’d make you feel good, he had this wonderful knack, for me, of making me feel like I was important,” Lillard said.

To this day, Sullivant, Lillard and Nichols all remember Ryan, if anything, as a player’s coach.

“If you were his, you were his for life,” Sullivant said.

During his time at GHS, he not only made his players feel special, he helped them continue their education. About 22 players received scholarships during two of his three years as coach. Lillard noted during this time GHS had a record of 7-3 and 6-4.

But at the same time, Ryan had what some might call a “my way or the highway” attitude.

“It didn’t matter if the superintendent of the school didn’t agree, it didn’t matter what anyone else thought,” Lillard said, “And that was probably one of his weak points. He lost some jobs because of it.”

Throughout the years, Ryan was not only fired from the Philadelphia Eagles and Arizona Cardinals, but from coaching the Leopards as well.

His players said he was fired for administrative reasons rather than the number of wins and losses, but to this day, they still don’t know the exact reason.

Ryan stayed at GHS until the end of the school year as a teacher, and Sullivant remembers it was difficult for Ryan to see someone else coach his players.

One day, Sullivant said, Ryan’s replacement had his players in the gym, hitting each other without pads on.

“He was absolutely destroyed for the simple reason that all of his boys hit hard and he knew somebody was going to be hurt,” Sullivant said.

Although he moved on to another high school after the Class of 1960 graduated, all three men have remained in close touch with their coach throughout the years. Ryan had returned to his old stomping grounds for their 40 and 50-year class reunions as well.

“As far as my life is concerned, and my attitude of life and my desire to compete at something…we stood on the shoulders of a giant,” Lillard said.