Into the Hall: George Link
Submitted photo
George Link rubbed elbows with some legendary coaches when he was a highly regarded football recruit after an impressive high school career at Laurel Highlands.
Notre Dame’s Ara Parseghian, Ohio State’s Woody Hayes, West Virginia’s Bobby Bowden, North Carolina State’s Lou Holtz and Pitt assistant coach Jackie Sherrill were among those who tried to convince Link to play football at their respective schools.
The 1973 Laurel Highlands graduate eventually opted for Sherrill and head coach Johnny Majors at Pitt. While there he saw playing time on a national championship football team in 1976 and was a starting lineman the following year when the Panthers followed up their Sugar Bowl rout of Georgia with a stomping of Clemson.
Link is a member of the Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2026.
“Certainly my induction is a thrill,” Link said while discussing his impending enshrinement on Hall of Fame co-founder George Von Benko’s Sports Line Talk Show on WMBS Radio.
“I was thrilled to no end, so proud to be a part of this group. I had a call from Jack Buehner and Chuck Correal, that are in the Hall of Fame, back in October. They said they were nominating me. And then to actually get (Von Benko’s) call, it was on my birthday, it was the best birthday gift I’ve ever had.”
Link did it all when he played for the Mustangs. His senior year he started at offensive guard, defensive linebacker and was LH’s kicker.
“I had the dirtiest uniform of the whole team,” Link said with a laugh. “I loved it and I would do it again the same way. My junior year Jack Buehner was a senior. He went to Penn State. I graduated the next year and went to Pitt. Then Chuck Correal, who played linebacker with me also, he was a year younger and went on to Penn State. So I was kind of sandwiched between two incredibly talented athletes and it was a privilege to play with them.”
Link recalled Laurel Highlands coaches at the time.
“It was (head coach) Fred Botti and Mr. T, John Trivonovich,” said Link, who noted of Trivonovich, “He was very big on getting us started in the weight room. He brought his barbells in. He talked about conditioning, eating wheat germ and all these other get-big drinks to develop our muscles. He was like a trainer but he was also a friend and our coach.”
Link was an outstanding player for the Mustangs who was named first team all-state, all-WPIAL and selected to the Pennsylvania Big 33 team in 1972. He was chosen all county and all-conference twice and for his school’s B’nai Brith award. “I thought that was a beautiful award to receive,” Link said.
Link was chosen as the Mustangs Offensive and Defensive MVP his senior year.
“I was shocked myself. I was truly honored,” Link said. “That was just something I didn’t ask for but it came with a vote from my teammates.”
Link’s Big 33 game brought him together with an eventual Pro Football Hall of Fame player who he would be teammates with at Pitt.
“I played in the 33 game as a linebacker. We beat Ohio. Tony Dorsett was our running back in that game,” Link recalled. “I didn’t know where all the players were from. Some of them were going to Penn State. Some of us were going to Pitt. It was just a wonderful camaraderie that hot summer at Gettysburg College where we had camp prior to playing in Hershey.”
When it came time to decide on where to go to college, Link was highly recruited by several top NCAA Division-I programs.
“I was looking at Duke University, North Carolina State. Ohio State was interested. I got to meet with Woody Hayes,” Link pointed out. “I also met with Ara Parseghian when I flew to Notre Dame and he offered me the scholarship when I came.
“My parents didn’t want me to go to Notre Dame. My mother wanted me to go to Duke. My father was from Raleigh, North Carolina, and wanted me to go to NC State. Then Pitt came into the picture. Pitt had released their whole coaching staff that year. Coach (Foge) Fazio had recruited me and then he was gone. The next thing I know Coach Sherrill was in my high school about three or four days a week trying to get me to come to Pitt.”
Penn State entered the foray as well.
“At the very end, I was down to these four schools – Notre Dame, Pitt, North Carolina (State) and Duke – and I get a call from (Penn State assistant coach) Jerry Sandusky and he was like can to you come up for a weekend? I’m like, where have you been, to myself. It’s late April. I would’ve. If Joe Paterno would’ve said, ‘George, would you come to Penn State, I would’ve jumped on it. I would’ve said yes sir.’ But I never heard from Coach Paterno, who I had the most respect for. I knew that Jack had gone up there. This is before Chuck Correal went.”
Another late entry into Link’s recruiting was West Virginia.
“Bobby Bowden and West Virginia was very significant,” Link said. “They came in to visit me and Bobby Bowden was sitting in our living room with about six other coaches with Frank Cignetti, who I really liked. But West Virginia got blown out in the Peach Bowl (49-13 to NC State) and I thought I can’t go to that school as far as the competitiveness there.”
Sherrill was very persuasive, according to Link.
“He was very good,” Link said. “He wanted to arm wrestle me to get me to come to Pitt. My dad said no, we’re not going to do that. I think I could’ve taken him,” Link said with a chuckle, “but I don’t know. That was kind of a funny spot.
“Lou Holtz came up. He flew up to the Connellsville airport. At that time he was with NC State. I had gone down there for a visit. He came into the house and was doing card tricks and entertaining us. My dad said well how long are you going to be at NC State. He didn’t reveal, he said I’ll be there for four years or while George is there. Sure enough he left after two years I think after that.”
LInk eventually began weeding out the offers.
“We threw out Notre Dame, Duke and North Carolina State and went with Pitt, that were recruiting me very heavily,” Link said.
Link was one of the strongest members of the team when he got to Pittsburgh.
“At the time I was bench-pressing more than anybody there, squatting more,” Link said. “I came with a class, they recruited I think 160 players. It was camp Johnstown. It was hot there, too. But I had just come off of Big 33 football camp so I was probably in the best shape ever to go into camp. “
Link soon was caught in a position change.
“They told me I would be playing starting linebacker – that’s how they got me to come – in a 44 defense, four linebackers and four down linemen,” Link said. “Then they changed to a 52 defense and I was playing second-team linebacker.”
Injuries thinned out the nose tackle position and Link was then switched there.
“So I was in a position that I wasn’t familiar with and started trying to work my way into the lineup that way,” said Link, who did get to see some varsity action.
“When I went to the West Virginia game that year, I had played in the JV game the night before at Pitt Stadium.” Link remembered. “Then they drove a few of us down for the West Virginia game and I got in to play right at the end at linebacker. That was fun for me. I made a tackle. It was kind of fun to walk around the field pregame because some of my friends were yelling, ‘Hey Link,’ and I would wave to them, down in Morgantown. That was kind of a cool thing to be down there.”
That would be Link’s last action for over a year.
“When I came home I was sick,” Link explained. “They took me over to the hospital and said you have mononucleosis. I was hospitalized for a week, got back home and had to recover from that and then get ready for the spring football season. That took awhile, only to be red-shirted when I came back in the fall.”
It was a discouraging time for Link, who credited his parents for keeping his spirits up.
“Then my third year at Pitt – I was there five years – they put me back at offensive line and I hadn’t played that in three years.” Link said. “They put me behind an All-American, Tom Brzoza. I said to myself I’m never going to play,” Link added with a chuckle. “I was behind him a couple years.”
Even so, Link got on the field a lot during the Panthers’ run to an undefeated season and the 1976 national championship which was secured with a lopsided win over Georgia in the Sugar Bowl.
“I also played on special teams,” Link said. “It was amazing. We got national championship rings. They were tailored after the Steelers’ first Super Bowl, almost identical, with the diamond in the middle. I was so proud to be a part of that with all my teammates.”
Link recalled playing with Dorsett.
“It was very easy. You just had to give him a crack and he would go all the way,” Link said. “He would make his own plays. He was impossible to tackle. When I was playing linebacker on the scout defense we would juke around us like we were just standing still. He was pretty amazing.”
Link earned a spot in the starting lineup at right guard as a senior in 1977.
“Matt Carroll, who was also an All-American, they moved him to tackle. So I was sandwiched between two All-Americans,” Link said. “I had to play good. It was not a choice.
“We played in the Gator Bowl and we crushed Clemson, 34-3, and Matt Cavanaugh had a (school) record of (387) yards passing. Being an offensive lineman you protect your quarterback so we’re very proud of that moment. The year before that in the Sugar Bowl we beat Georgia 27-3, so it was almost identical wins and domination over these two teams. I’m very proud of that.”
Link went into the medical field following his football career at Pitt.
“I went back to school and got a degree in nuclear medicine technology and I worked five years in the hospital field,” Link said. “I was a nuclear medicine tech. They paid for school to go back and get my masters of health. That was a benefit of working in the hospital. They paid for my tuition reimbursement and I got my master’s degree at Pitt.
“I couldn’t find a job yet, though. Finally Butler was advertising for a counselor in the Pittsburgh Press and I applied and I was hired. That’s where I met my future wife Nancy. Every time she gets mad at me she says why did you answer that ad in the paper?”
Link then changed fields.
“I started a counseling service on my own,” he said. “I called it Link Counseling Services and did that for about five years and had a contract with Children and Youth of Butler County and I would drive around and work with foster kids in the evening. We had two children, David and Ashley, (Nancy) did the lion’s share of raising our children while I was driving around at night trying to get a few extra dollars for the family.”
Link got into high school coaching at Butler for a five-year period.
“About after five or six years, new coaches came in from the outside. They asked me to coach,” Link recalled. “I said I would. They started me at the junior high with the offensive linemen, which I loved doing. Coaching isn’t work, coaching to me was fun. It’s like a love, a natural.
“I did that for two years, and then they gave me the head coaching job at the junior high.
Link was promoted to junior varsity coach the next two years before stepping down.
“That was the extent of my coaching,” said Link, who added with a laugh, “As my children were growing up, I think the boss, my wife, wanted me to spend more time at home with the kids. So I did that.”
Link will be in attendance for his induction.
“I look forward to seeing everybody there,” LInk said. “I’m so honored.”
Tickets are sold out for the Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame luncheon/social and the annual golf outing, which will take place Friday at Pleasant Valley Golf Club.