Chet Moeller is uncomfortable with receiving individual accolades.
Moeller excelled at what he characterized as the ultimate team game and believes whatever success he achieved with Navy football was made possible by others.
Moeller was named a consensus All-American in 1974 and inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2010. On Saturday, the 1976 academy graduate will join an extremely exclusive fraternity when his No. 48 jersey is retired by the Navy football program.
Moeller’s reaction to this latest honor is the same as it was when the College Football Foundation selected him as a Hall of Famer. The 67-year-old’s immediate thought was to thank his Navy coaches and teammates.
Lenny Fontes was the defensive backs coach who taught the talented safety proper tackling technique and preached the importance of scouting opponents. “Chet, you’ve got to get in here and watch film,” Fontes would say.
Rick Lantz was the Navy defensive coordinator who devised a scheme that was centered around Moeller’s remarkable ability to read and react. Lantz moved Moeller closer to the line of scrimmage and gave him the freedom to revolutionize the safety position during that era.
Then there was Steve Belichick, the grizzled veteran assistant every Navy player respected. Moeller was thankful for the encouragement and motivation of Belichick, who could be alternately positive and negative with his comments.
“You might not have always liked what Coach Belichick had to say but he made you want to be a better football player,” said Moeller, who settled in Montgomery, Alabama, after serving as an officer in the Marine Corps. He is a currently president of Harrison Information Technology.
Lantz realized he had a special player after Moeller enjoyed a breakout season as a sophomore. Going into the 1973 campaign, Lantz devised a scheme predicated on preventing opponents from running between the tackles.
“Our strategy was to force everything outside. Coach Lantz instructed everyone to plug their gap and bounce the play to the perimeter,” Moeller said.
Naturally, the strategy would not have worked if defensive linemen such as Bob Caulk and Dave Papak did not hold the point of attack or linebackers like Mark Thorpe, Randy Hutcherson and Andy Bushak failed to fill holes inside. Moeller would not have been able to play on the second level and essentially freelance if not for the support of free safety Gene Ford or cornerbacks Ed Jeter and Lenny Mokan.
“I would never of had the opportunity to make the tackles I did unless my teammates were following the coaching staff’s instructions and forcing running plays outside,” Moeller said.
Moeller lined up 5 yards deep on the strong side of the formation and angled inward. He read the two guards, tight end and quarterback, saying “those four players told me exactly what was going to happen.”
“I got to a point where I could recognize plays very quickly,” Moeller said. “If I saw the two guards pulling and the quarterback turn to pitch, I was in the backfield.”
Moeller amassed 275 total tackles from 1973 through 1975 and is widely considered the greatest defensive player to ever suit up for the Midshipmen. He set a single-season school record with 25 tackles for loss in 1974 and was named East Coast Athletic Conference Player of the Year in 1975.
Bushak, who played alongside Moeller for three seasons, told The Capital in 2012 that teammates were in awe of the way Moeller played football.
“Chet truly set the standard for how to play safety. He was unafraid to go full-speed and sacrifice his body in order to blow up a blocker or make a tackle,” said Bushak, who died in 2018 at the age of 63.
Fontes was the defensive backs coach at Dayton when he discovered Moeller, a product of Fairmont West High in Kettering, Ohio. Moeller thought he could play at a high level than Dayton, but only received scholarship offers from the likes of Ball State and Bowling Green.
Moeller dreamed of playing for Ohio State and following in the footsteps of Jack Tatum, his boyhood idol who went on to star with the Oakland Raiders. Deemed too small and slow by scouts at Big Ten Conference schools, he jumped at the chance to play at Navy.
“When the opportunity to attend the Naval Academy came up, I thought that would be great. I figured I would get a fantastic education and be able to serve this country I love so much, while also playing college football at a high level against top opponents,” said Moeller, noting Navy’s schedule featured such powerhouses as Boston College, Michigan, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh and Syracuse in those days.
Moeller was sixth string at safety during the spring of his plebe year but rose to No. 1 on the depth chart by the beginning of the 1973 season. He would start as a sophomore (a rarity in those days) and spent the next three seasons terrorizing opposing offenses.
Moeller spearheaded a hard-nosed stingy defense that ranked third nationally in both points and yards allowed and helped third-year head coach George Welsh lead Navy to a 7-4 record in 1975, snapping a stretch of seven straight losing seasons and setting the stage for five consecutive winning campaigns.
Highlight-reel hits
Moeller’s aggressive style, textbook tackling technique and uncanny ability to explode on blockers and ball-carriers prompted Fontes to make him the subject of a training tape. Titled Chet Moeller Run Support, the video has become legendary and been circulated to college football programs throughout the country.
“It’s just a perfect example of how to play defensive football as far as coming in low, staying square to the ball and hitting with incredible force,” said former Navy defensive coordinator Buddy Green, who used the original tape to demonstrate tackling fundamentals.
That highlight tape shows Moeller repeatedly firing into the backfield as though shot out of a cannon and blowing up run plays by diving at the legs of lead blockers and tailbacks, often taking out both at the same time.
“I would say Chet’s instinct for knowing where the ball was going was uncanny. It was almost like a sixth sense,” said Thorpe, a longtime Annapolis resident. “Chet studied film relentlessly and knew what offenses wanted to do. He was always around the ball and running at 100 MPH.”
Thorpe recalled playing Pittsburgh when it featured tailback Tony Dorsett, the 1976 Heisman Trophy winner. In 1975, Navy shut out Pitt, 17-0, by corralling the three-time All-American. On one play, Thorpe was able to grab Dorsett by the shoulders as he tried to turn the corner.
“Chet came flying in from behind and hit Dorsett so hard he knocked him out of my grasp,” Thorpe said. “Back in the huddle, I said ‘Hey Chester, if you had hit my arm it would have broken into pieces.'”
Thorpe always marveled at how Moeller single-handedly broke up the wedge as part of the kickoff coverage unit.
Tom O’Brien was part of the offensive coaching staff that had to face the Moeller-led defense in practice every day during that era. O’Brien, who followed Welsh to Virginia then later become head coach at Boston College and NC State, said Moeller was one of the toughest, most physical players he’s ever seen.
“Chet had a great first step. He never took a false step because he had such great instincts and really studied his opponents. That enabled him to be very decisive in his reads,” O’Brien said. “I remember there were highlight tapes of Chet attacking the toss sweep, which was the top running play of the day. There were many fullbacks and guards that never wanted to see Chet Moeller again!”
Moeller was a ferocious hitter who knocked many an opponent out of the game despite being listed at a modest 6-foot and 175 pounds. He played with reckless abandon and hit like a ton of bricks by launching his body at full speed.
“It was all physics: Force equals mass times acceleration and mass times velocity,” said Bushak, who was named to the 50th anniversary All-Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium team along with Moeller. “Chet played the game with great intensity and physicality.”
Moeller is the first defensive player to have his jersey retired by the Naval Academy Athletic Association. He joins quarterbacks Roger Staubach (No. 12) and Keenan Reynolds (No. 19) along with running backs Joe Bellino (No. 27) and Napoleon McCallum (No. 30) as Navy football legends so honored.
Navy will recognize Moeller during the second television timeout of the first quarter. He will be joined for the on-field ceremony by his wife of 44 years Jenny and two children — Rachel and Trey. Several former teammates and a group of friends from Birmingham will also be in attendance.
CENTRAL FLORIDA@NAVY
Saturday, 3:30 p.m.
TV: CBS Sports Network Radio: 1430 AM, 1090 AM
Line: UCF by 16
