Whenever the fireworks go off and the roar of the crowd echoes through Memorial Stadium as the players come onto the field, the IU football team touches “Hep’s Rock,” located at the end of the tunnel.
“I treat it like a good luck charm,” junior linebacker David Cooper said. “When I’m running out, I’ll come by and give it a little tap. Last year I used to rub it. But now that we run out, I tap it.”
Hep’s Rock is a 3-ton piece of limestone located at the north end of Memorial Stadium. Its namesake, former IU Coach Terry Hoeppner, intended it to be motivational for players as they come onto the field.
However, some players are unsure of why the rock is important.
“But I really don’t know the history of it,” Cooper said, turning to look at the rock.
The rock was installed May 9, 2005, when former IU Coach Terry Hoeppner took over the program in 2005.
“Considering that Bloomington is in the heart of limestone country, it was a perfect fit,” he said in 2005. “All along I felt that this program needed a unique identity, something that the players and fans could relate to.”
The Rock is a remnant from construction of Memorial Stadium in 1960. It has two holes, on the top and bottom, from the drilling process.
When asked how much he knew about Hep’s Rock, junior defensive lineman Bobby Richardson said, “not much,” while shaking his head.
Hoeppner, a Woodburn, Ind., native, died June 19, 2007, from brain cancer.
In 2006, Hoeppner’s final season, the team went 5-7 and recorded three Big Ten wins, including a victory against No. 13 Iowa.
Attendance increased 39 percent while Hoeppner was the coach, and student ticket sales saw a 110 percent increase.
The team has not won more than three Big Ten games in a season since.
In 2007, the first season after Hoeppner had died, IU made it a mission to make it to a bowl game, and it did. The Hoosiers defeated Purdue 27-24 to secure their sixth win and become bowl eligible.
This year’s team entered the season with media hype about having the potential to be the first team since that 2007 team to return to a bowl game.
The only major losses from last year’s team came at defensive tackle and at center on the offensive line.
Otherwise, almost everyone returns from last year’s team, making it one of the most experienced, yet also one of the youngest, teams in the nation.
IU finished the non-conference season 2-2. It will need at least four Big Ten victories to become bowl eligible for the first time since 2007.
To honor Hoeppner, IU eventually renamed the piece of limestone Hep’s Rock. But the players are unsure of what the rock means to the program.
“I really don’t know much about it,” senior safety Greg Heban said. “I’ve been with (former IU Coach Bill) Lynch and (IU Coach Kevin) Wilson.
So I never really knew much about Hep’s Rock. People don’t really talk about it as much because people that were with Hoeppner already graduated.”
Though the players might not know a lot about the history and what Hoeppner meant to the IU program, Heban said it is still important to honor him by respecting Hep’s Rock.
“Even though we might not have known him that well, we still have to continue the tradition,” Heban said.
Follow reporter Evan Hoopfer on Twitter @EvanHoopfer.
