Longtime college football coach Steve Kragthorpe, who spent two seasons with the Bills, died Sunday night after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease, the Louisville Courier-Journal reports. Kragthorpe was 59.
Kragthorpe, who played quarterback at Eastern New Mexico and West Texas, began his coaching career at Northern Arizona in 1990. He then coached at North Texas, Boston College and Texas A&M.
In 2001, Kragthorpe joined the Bills to coach the quarterbacks under Gregg Williams. Drew Bledsoe had his fourth and final Pro Bowl season in 2002 with Kragthorpe, throwing for 4,359 yards with 24 touchdowns and 15 interceptions.
Kragthorpe left the Bills after two seasons to take his first head coaching job, replacing Keith Burns at the University of Tulsa.
The Golden Hurricanes went to three bowl games in four years with Kragthorpe after not having had a winning season since 1991. Kragthorpe went into the Tulsa Hall of Fame earlier this year.
He spent three seasons as head coach at Louisville and finished his head coaching career with a 44-43 record.
Kragthorpe went to LSU as offensive coordinator in 2011 but stepped down after his Parkinson’s diagnosis. He instead spent two years in Baton Rouge in an off-field role.