May 3, 2006
Former University of New Mexico head football coach Bill Weeks passed away last night at an Albuquerque hospital. He was 76. Funeral arrangements are pending.
“On behalf of the Lobo football program, we want to offer our condolences to the family of Bill Weeks,” said current New Mexico head football coach Rocky Long, who came to UNM in the fall of 1968. “Every Lobo head coach to follow Bill Weeks has been trying to reach the level that his teams attained. Winning three straight conference championships – no matter what era – is extremely difficult.”
Bill Weeks won more conference championships – three – than any head coach in the history of Lobo football. Taking over for Marv Levy before the 1960 season at the young age of 31, Weeks’ early teams set the standard by which all other New Mexico squads are measured.
After starting his head coaching career 5-5 in 1960, Weeks and the Lobos embarked on the most successful four-year run in school history. In 1961, UNM finished 7-4 and won the Aviation Bowl with a 29-12 victory over Western Michigan.
That was followed by outright Western Athletic Conference titles in 1962 and ’63 and tying for the crown in 1964. From 1961-64, the Lobos won 29 games against just 12 losses and one tie for the best four-year record in program history.
Weeks spent eight seasons (1960-67) as head coach at New Mexico, compiling a career record of 40-41-1. He was the school’s winningest football coach until current head coach Rocky Long surpassed him in September of 2005. Weeks was inducted into the University of New Mexico Athletic Hall of Honor in 2005, while his 1961 Lobo team was inducted in 1990.
Weeks graduated from Hampton, Iowa, High School in 1947 after an athletics career that included three football letters as a halfback (all-state as a senior), three basketball letters and two track letters.
He continued his career at Iowa State where he was starting quarterback for Coach Abe Stuber for three seasons (1948-50). Weeks was an all-Big Seven Conference choice in his junior and senior years and finished third in the nation in total offense in 1950.
After his senior season, Weeks played in the East-West Shrine game and in the Hula Bowl. He was scheduled to play in the College All-Star Game in Chicago in the summer of 1951, but was called to active duty with the Marine Corps and was forced to miss the All-Star Classic.
Following graduation from Iowa State in 1951, Weeks was drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles and signed a contract with them, but an automobile accident in which he nearly severed an Achilles tendon ended any possibility of a professional football career.
Upon completion of active duty with the Marines, Weeks returned to Iowa State for graduate work where he received a master’s degree in psychology. He worked as a graduate assistant in 1953, coaching the Iowa State freshmen for one year (2-0).
Weeks’ first full-time coaching job came in 1954 at Grinnell, Iowa, High School, a Class-A school playing football in a Class-AA conference. His first year record was only 4-5, but it marked the first time in 10 seasons that Grinnell had won a conference game.
Grinnell improved to 5-3-1 in 1955. After that year, Dick Clausen, then Lobo head football coach, called Weeks to join him at New Mexico.
Weeks was ends coach and chief scout on Clausen’s staff for two years (1956-57), then took over as backfield coach under Levy in 1958-59. Weeks mentored fellow Iowa native Don Perkins, who rushed for 2,001 career yards and was named a third team All-America by the Associated Press in 1959.