Cornell University Athletics

Cullen joined the Cornell athletic department in 1943 as an assistant football coach under Carl Snavely. During his 41 years here he has coached three levels of football – varsity, junior varsity and lightweight, two levels of lacrosse (varsity and freshman), and junior varsity basketball and as the assistant varsity basketball coach. But he is best known as coach of the very popular 150-pound football team. He revived the lightweight team in 1946 after the three-year interruption of World War II. He served as head coach that year, returned in 1958, and retained that post until he retired from coaching in 1978. His 21 lightweight teams have compiled a record of 73-46-5 and figured in two championships-tying for the Eastern League title in 1975 and winning it outright in 1978 with a 5-0 mark. In 1984 his peers in the ELFL named the league’s championship trophy the Bob Cullen Trophy. Cullen, who was raised in Palmrya, N.Y., is a 1937 graduate of Hobart College.