General | 11/2/2017 7:45:00 AM

The following feature first appeared in the football game program on Oct. 28, 2017.

When Dave Hoover, who, as it turned out, was entering the latter of his two seasons as the head coach of the Wayne State University football team, was recruiting a 5-foot-11, 220-pound Gregory DeMars in 1973, he was projecting that the short, strong, tough-as-nails center from Grosse Pointe North High School in Detroit's northeast suburbs could be an asset to the school.

That's what coaches in all sports do in recruiting, which is the lifeblood of any college athletics program. They try to gauge the future and make their best guess as to how a prospect, with some growth, maturity and development, will fit in with the team. They analyze his potential and determine how much of it he will realize.

But neither Hoover nor, for that matter, DeMars, could have possibly foreseen the kind of enormous impact he would have not just on the Tartars football program (that was the nickname for all Wayne State teams from 1927-99), but also for the school overall. That's especially true considering that little of DeMars' contribution – his worth, his being an asset to Hoover and his successor, Wayne State Athletic Hall of Famer Dick Lowry – came from his time as a player since his career ended after just 2½ years due to a knee injury. And that impact continues to this day.

Just look around the Wayne State campus and you'll see DeMars' imprint, and that of his wife of nearly 40 years and fellow WSU graduate, Phyllis, just about everywhere. Among the school's most benevolent donors, they have benefitted the football team with the DeMars Family Locker Room, named in recognition of the family's long association with the school. Their diverse reach has also touched the School of Law, the College of Education and the Department of Athletics.

The gift of the locker room is particularly special to DeMars because of his involvement with the team all those years ago.

"My wife would like to have been a little less out there with the locker room," DeMars said of the name on the building. "I've got a little more of an ego. I understand that Wayne State gave me the opportunity to play football. 

"Rob (Fournier, WSU's longtime director of athletics) convinced us that it would really help him with the school's fund-raising efforts if we allowed him to use our name like that.
"I'm glad to see the football program doing so much better. When I went to school there, the facilities weren't very good. They are now. Rob is an impressive guy. He knows how to get things done. He's been a great AD for Wayne State."

When it's all said and done, DeMars, with what he's done post-graduation, was one of the best recruits Hoover had in his short stint at WSU, or that any football coach in school history has had.

Think about it:

*Coaches hope that their recruits who suffer career-ending injuries remain in school and finish their education. DeMars did exactly that – impressively so.

"It was disappointing to have to stop playing football, but I already knew I was going to eventually start working toward getting a law degree," he said.

Pittsburgh Steelers Pro Football Hall of Fame head coach Chuck Noll used to tell his players at the end of their careers and needing to transition to the next step in their lives, "It's time to move on to your life's work."

That's what DeMars did. It all worked out for the best. 

*Coaches hope their recruits get a degree. DeMars did better – much better – than that, earning no fewer than three degrees from Wayne State.

"I kept going back because I couldn't get it right," joked DeMars, who received a bachelor's degree in criminal justice, a master's degree in public administration and a law degree.

*Coaches hope their recruits do well academically. That's another one on which he scored a touchdown, with his law degree coming magna cum laude.

*Coaches want their recruits to be successful professionally. Once again, DeMars did just that – and then some – by first working as a clerk for then Michigan Chief Justice G. Mennen Williams before going on to spend 3½ decades practicing law as a partner at the Detroit firm of Honigman, Miller, Schwartz and Cohn, LLP.

"I worked seven days a week for 34 years," the 62-year-old DeMars said. "I was a workaholic.

"People paid me a lot to advise them on their affairs, so there was a lot of pressure on me. I love pressure. I am a fighter. When I had to fight for my clients, I did. I have a lot of fight and backbone in me. It's how I approach life in general.

"But after a while, you've had enough of that. It was time to retire."

And so he did.

*But, more than anything, coaches want their recruits, no matter their eventual profession, to be contributing members of society. DeMars has – literally and figuratively – and is still doing so.

Refusing to kick back after retiring from one job, he has found two more to do as a volunteer, along with serving on no fewer than six boards. So he hasn't really retired by any stretch of the imagination. He has simply shifted his focus to the fun stuff, that which knows no pressure.  

Reaching him by phone late one afternoon recently, he was just leaving one of those responsibilities, ready to navigate his way home through yet another evening rush hour.  The more things change, the more they stay the same.

DeMars grasps the greatest virtue of life, that it is not really about you, but rather about others.

"I'm not a religious zealot or anything, but I am a product of eight years of Catholic education and it has had a profound effect on me," DeMars said. 

"It is important to me to help people to the extent that I can. It's better to serve than to be served. That's also the mission of Wayne State.

"It's what we have passed down to our kids (a son, 35, and two daughters, ages 31 and 28), that we need to give back for the blessings we've received. My wife and I both owe Wayne State a lot."

DeMars is the quintessential American success story. He lived the first part of his life in the Detroit suburb of Lincoln Park, but when his parents divorced, his father ceased to continue to be an influence or a presence in his life and his mother, Bettie, took the family to Grosse Pointe to live with his maternal grandmother, with whom he was extremely close.

"I was a poor kid growing up, the first kid of the family," he said. "My mom raised her family on a secretary's salary. She believed strongly in her kids getting an education. It was very important to her.

"I wanted to go to Michigan or Michigan State, but I didn't have the money."

What he did have, though, was the ability to play football, which caught the attention of Hoover, who convinced him to come to Wayne State.

DeMars didn't know a great deal about the school and, as he put it, "I wasn't really familiar with the part of town where Wayne State is located."
But it was a way to keep playing football and to go to school at the same time. And, most importantly, his mom really wanted him to get that education.

"I was the first member of my family to attend college," DeMars said.

So it was an easy decision and a life-changing one not just for him, but also for a lot of people he and his wife will never know. It got DeMars started on his way in life. It has done the same for others, and continues to do so because of all of his and his wife's philanthropy.

The DeMars attended the same high school, but because Grosse Pointe North was so big – there were over 700 students in their graduation class -- they didn't really know each other, or so it is alleged, anyway.

"I kid her that she did really know who I was since I was such a big football star," he said with a laugh.  As it turned out, they met at a big party the day after graduation.

It is said that behind every successful man, there is a great woman. And that's certainly the case with the DeMars.

Phyllis earned her degree in Elementary and Special Education from Wayne State, and for many years. she taught as part of the Archdiocese of Detroit in elementary and middle schools and special education. She is active in many civic and outreach activities, and both she and her husband are charter members of the Anthony Wayne Society.

"In being a lawyer, I was well-paid for my work," Gregory DeMars said. "I was able to maximize the talent that God gave me, and that's what you're supposed to do.

"But it's not about money and business. It's about helping people. I helped people, but my wife really helped people. She worked in special education with kids who were learning-disabled."

Indeed, the DeMars' has been a life well-lived, and that's the best legacy – the best gift – of all.