Los Angeles –Former USC assistant football coach Jim Stangeland, who was on the staff of the Trojans’ 1967 national championship team and also was the head football coach at Long Beach State and Long Beach City College, died on Saturday (Oct. 25) in Huntington Beach of natural causes. He was 92. Stangeland was an assistant under USC head coach John McKay for four seasons (1965-68). During that span, the Trojans went 33-8-2, played in three Rose Bowls, won three conference titles and produced two Heisman Trophy winners. Troy’s 1967 national championship squad went 10-1 and defeated Indiana in the Rose Bowl. was an All-CIF end in football and also a pole vaulter at Huntington Beach (Calif.) High. He set the school’s pole vault record that stood for 50 years (it was broken by a vaulter he helped coach).
He was a member of USC’s football and track teams in 1942, but his Trojan career was sidelined by a knee injury so he became a pilot in the Air Force. He then went to Arizona State, where he was a 4-time Border Conference pole vault champion and played defensive end on the 1948 Sun Devil football team. more
