Joe O’Brien doesn’t get enough credit for one of the greatest moments in Boise State football history.
Life got complicated, almost tragic.
A great story about one man’s passion for football turned into a horrific story about drugs, a secret addiction and federal prison.
And here we are, 30 years later …
O’Brien was a rock star amongst rock stars on Boise State’s 1994 team that finished 13-2 and played in the NCAA I-AA (now FCS) national championship game. That Pokey Allen-led team, one of the most inspiring in Boise State history, is gathering in Boise this weekend for a 30-year reunion.
Mike Prater
O’Brien, intimidating as a team captain with a monster motor on the field and a giant personality in life, is coming back to Boise to celebrate with teammates and coaches. To celebrate memories of a wonderful season. To celebrate his newfound peace of mind.
When that 1994 season ended in Huntington, West Virginia, with a loss to defending champion Youngstown State, O’Brien was the Big Sky Defensive Player of the Year and a two-time, first-team All-American.
Still, his greatest moment may have happened earlier that season, on Nov. 12, in Cheney, Washington, where Boise State beat Eastern Washington 16-13 in a Big Sky game dominated by temperatures in the 30s, rain and thick layers of mud.
Still wet, still muddy, still breathing hard, O’Brien told me immediately after the game that he “guaranteed’’ a victory over the Idaho Vandals in the next week’s regular season finale. Going into the 1994 season, Idaho had beaten rival Boise State in 12 straight games.
His guarantee made headlines. It created hate inside a rivalry already full of hate. He never wavered from his words.
“You’ve got to believe, and I always felt it was my job to make sure everybody believed,’’ he says now.
Boise State beat Idaho 27-24 in a thriller, fans rushed the blue field, a coach tried to climb a goalpost, the Broncos went on an impressive postseason run, and O’Brien was a hero in a Boise State football town loaded with heroes.
My words that year – in a story for the Idaho Statesman: “Every child should have a hero like Boise State football player Joe O’Brien.’’
He gave the NFL a quick shot and played various stages of pro football. He eventually turned his attention to coaching, in part through a mentorship with Boise State Hall of Famer Pete Kwiatkowski, and he spent 2000-2002 on the Montana State staff. For the 2002 season, O’Brien was promoted to assistant head coach.
One problem. O’Brien had secrets. He was a drug addict, like his father on the mean streets of Pittsburg, California.
In September 2003, one year after his Montana State promotion, O’Brien was arrested on charges of conspiracy to distribute meth, distribution of meth near a school and 24 counts of money laundering.
O’Brien spent two-and-a-half years in federal prison.
His story went national, and he became the focus of an ESPN “Outside the Lines’’ package and co-wrote a book with a Boise author: “Broken Bronco: From Addiction to Redemption.”
Then it happened again. The drug addict thing. More trouble. Another arrest.
In June 2016, O’Brien crashed his vehicle into a telephone pole and a tree, just minutes from his Montana home. Then 43, he was charged with criminal possession of dangerous drugs, a felony, and driving under the influence of narcotics, a misdemeanor.
I’ve been writing about O’Brien for 30 years, football and life.
We’ve touched base a few times over those 30 years. I talked to him Tuesday. I can’t wait to see him this weekend. We’ll hug it out. We’ll share stories about getting old.
Today, O’Brien is 52 and lives in Great Falls, Montana, where he’s a branch manager for a national roof supply distribution company. He has been with his wife, Gracie, for 21 years. “She’s been through hell and back four times with me.’’
O’Brien has three children: Haley, 26; Tuff, 12; and Emme, 9. They’re highly athletic, bold and blunt – like their dad. They all know dad’s story.
“I’ve been sober for eight and a half years. I’m really proud of that, even though it’s still day-by-day,’’ O’Brien told me Tuesday.
He doesn’t follow Boise State football anymore, other than a few Ashton Jeanty highlights. He said he doesn’t know the name of any coaches on the current staff. He has other priorities these days.
“We all live and we all learn, we all love and we all hate, but my outlook on life is much different these days. … I’m heavily involved in church. I have a lot of amends to make, man, a lot of them.
“I couldn’t be happier, honestly.’’
Except for one last chapter of conflict. Leftover business from 1994.
“I’m pissed, I mean honestly, I’m pissed,’’ he said, changing his mood from blessed to fired up in an instant.
O’Brien thinks the 1994 team should be in the Boise State Hall of Fame, and he believes a few players on that team deserve to be in the Hall of Fame.
They aren’t.
They probably never will.
He has a theory.
“To be honest with you, I feel personally accountable for it because of my actions. There’s only been two consensus All-Americans at the school and I’m one of them. There’s no question I should be in the Hall of Fame. There’s no question the team, the players, they should be in the Hall of Fame, but I know why and I feel like my team has been held hostage because of that.
“I do carry that burden. That is probably the only burden I still carry. I just can’t make peace with it because I feel there’s 90, or how many guys, who suffered because of my wrongdoings in the early 2000s and that bothers me.’’
Boise State’s Hall of Fame is void of many great players and teams of the past. Its concept remains a work in progress – so I can’t speak for his opinions, or if he should be in the Hall of Fame.
I do know this, after 30 years of watching a young football star turn into a “shameful” adult, then into a proud man with grizzled scars: O’Brien has battled the demons of life harder than almost anyone I know. He’s won in life. He’s conquered life. He nearly destroyed his life. He almost lost his life.
Joe O’Brien, one of my all-time favorites, should be in the Hall of Fame of Life.
Mike Prater is the Bronco Nation News columnist who co-hosts Idaho Sports Talk (KTIK 95.3 FM on Monday-Friday from 3-6 p.m.) and the Boise State football postgame show (KBOI 670 AM). He is on Twitter @MikeFPrater and can be reached at mikefprater@gmail.com
