“I just want to honor Cole” - 24 years after son Cole's death, Marc Pittman looks to share ex-Longhorn's story in movie project

[Blake Munroe]

(From Kirk Bohls. Link to story at bottom of post.)

AUSTIN — At precisely 9:30 every evening, Marc Pittman’s cell phone would ring.

Actually, that’s not completely true because on so many occasions, Pittman and his son Cole would call each other at the exact same time that they’d pick up automatically at the same time.

The message from Cole would never vary.

“I love you, Dad,” he would start.

“I love you,” Marc would reply.

Their personal “I love you” calls. Every single night.

This loving, father-son relationship was tragically interrupted almost 24 years ago when Cole Pittman’s red Chevy pickup truck swerved off the road, flipped over, landed upside down in a creek bed and killed the 21-year-old University of Texas defensive end.

To this day, Marc Pittman misses those phone calls.

The one-vehicle accident on Feb. 26, 2001, so moved the entire Longhorn football program that for over a year, many of Cole’s closest teammates would call Marc at 9:30 to check in with him. That’s the impact Cole Pittman had on his buddies.

Marc Pittman speaks proudly of the legacy his oldest son left for so many. He had speaking engagements at churches and schools and to other grief-stricken families all over the country to talk about his loss but also spread the hope that the message of constant, reassuring love would not fall on deaf ears. He co-authored a book after Cole and heard from people as far away as Australia and Africa.

The story of his unwavering devotion to his son will be told once again, this time on the big screen, as director Houston Hill in partnership with Crowbar Films have plans in the works to make a feature-length movie about the Pittmans and showcase their story of love and faithfulness to a whole other audience.

“It’s bittersweet,” Pittman told the Houston Chronicle about the project. “When I scanned Cole’s casket at the funeral, I made him two promises. That I’d be the man I wanted him to be and that I’d do everything in my power to make sure he’s not forgotten. This is another avenue to make sure he’s not forgotten. It’s a bad time that I will have to relive, the most horrific time in my life, but my goal is to make a difference in my life.”

He did so when he co-wrote a book called “A Father’s Story: Raising Cole” along with gifted former Austin American-Statesman and San Antonio Express News sportswriter Mark Wangrin that helped Marc get through the searing pain and loss. The book is still paying royalties and assisting those who lost loved ones.

Jared Christopher, a 44-year-old former Fort Worth Star-Telegram video journalist who created the Emmy-nominated docuseries “Texas 6” and directed the documentary series “Titletown, TX,” which won two Edward R. Murrow awards, was chosen to pen the screenplay for the as-yet-untitled film. No characters have been cast yet.

Former Longhorn head coach Mack Brown sat in on a recent meeting with executive producer Jimmy Saxton, a former Texas quarterback from 1990-93 and son of Longhorn legend and National Football Foundation Hall of Fame running back James Saxton, and Chris Keffer of Crowbar Films as well as Hill and a number of Cole’s former teammates like Stevie Lee, Matt Trissel, Chance Mock and Cole’s roommate Tillman Holloway. They met for four hours at a former Longhorn player’s home and swapped stories about Cole, the teammate, the prankster, the physical, fun-loving young man, who touched their lives.

“It was very emotional. We’re still in the early stages,” said Saxton, who hope to raise the necessary funds for the modestly priced film by the end of February. “We’re just starting the script.”

Brown will likely be a consultant on the movie but doesn’t envision playing himself in the film. The University of Texas is not directly involved but school officials have given their blessing to the project.

“I told I just wanted to be a consultant if they have questions,” said Brown, the second-winningest coach in Longhorn history who has moved back to Austin after a second coaching stint at North Carolina and is retired from coaching. “I think that’s all I’m going to do. I just want to help them tell the story. I think it will be a movie that will touch families who have lost a child and make the rest of them who haven’t cry.”

'I was in total shock'

Spring football practice was due to begin on a Tuesday in February 2001, but Cole wanted to go home and spend time with his parents the weekend before. Marc and Judy were totally surprised when he showed up at their Shreveport lakeside home. Marc went out to get the morning paper and there was his son’s pickup truck with Cole asleep so he wouldn’t awaken his parents late at night.

The day before Cole left to come back to Austin, he and his dad rode around in Marc’s Jeep and talked about life and the future and enjoyed their heartfelt conversations. They had gone to church that Sunday morning, and a friend later confided in Marc about Cole, “He glowed that weekend.”

The poignant comment stuck with Marc, who says, “I wonder, did he know he was spending his last weekend with us?”

Marc woke up first Monday and put on a pot of coffee. Cole wanted to leave for Austin by 4:30 in the morning so he could be back in time for a team meeting. Before he left, Cole went into his parents’ bedroom and kissed his mother goodbye. Three different times.

“It’s like there was this big plan, and he was never coming back,” Marc said. “Maybe he made a deal with God. He may have felt God put his arm around him and told Cole,  ‘You can look at all the people you can touch in your death and how many you can touch in your life. Which one do you want? ’ Cole was so unselfish, he said, ‘Take me.’”

Marc and Judy stayed in the doorway until they couldn’t hear his truck any more at the end of the road. Cole had left his cellphone behind.

Hours later, Marc was sitting at his desk in his office when members of Cole’s high school coaching staff at Evangel who had been alerted about the accident showed up about 1:30 that afternoon. Marc called Caren Lyons, Cole’s fiancé, but she didn’t pick up. He then called Mack Brown.

“Tell me my boy is there with you,” Marc said.

“I can’t,” Brown said. “I can’t.”

State troopers had discovered Pittman’s pickup truck on the side of U.S. Route 79 near Easterly, about 100 miles northeast of Austin. They found it on the other side of a creek along the highway and surmised he had driven down an embankment before coming to a stop.

They couldn’t find any identification, but somehow located a picture of Cole and sent it to Brown, who immediately recognized the 6-foot-5, 265-pound sophomore who had played 23 games for the Longhorns. Devastated, Brown broke down. The authorities guessed he had fallen asleep or become drowsy after taking prescribed muscle relaxants for his sore back, but no one knows for sure. Marc thinks Cole just fell asleep. None of it would change the terrible outcome.

“I was in total shock,” Brown said. “It was the worst thing that’s ever happened to me in my life. I don’t know how you tell parents they’ve lost their child. It was overwhelming.”

Brown gathered his thoughts and called his entire team for an emergency meeting to notify Cole’s teammates. Pittman had been a highly recruited all-state player from Evangel High where his teams won three straight Louisiana 1A state championships and a state-record 45 consecutive games.

Texas brought in psychologists and grief counselors to help the staff and team deal with the sorrow. Some players became totally depressed. Others cut up and laughed and remembered how funny Cole was. Like the time Cole hung a squirrel on the doorknob of teammate Chris Simms’ dorm room. Some cried in the corner.

Chase, Cole’s younger brother, would sign with Texas two years later and spend a season before having trouble with all the sad, constant reminders of Cole and transferred to LSU. He now lives two doors down from Marc and has taken over the family construction business. Marc and Judy later divorced, and Marc remarried to Annette.

“They say people handle grief differently,” Brown said. “The other thing it does, it triggers every bad thing that happened in your life.”

They buried Cole on a Wednesday as some 4,000 people crammed into or outside the brick veneer Shreveport Community Church as rain steadily pinged off the metal roof. They listened intently as Marc tenderly eulogized his son. Mack Brown spoke eloquently of loss and family and community. Six of Cole’s teammates served as pallbearers.

“It was raining, as nasty as it could be,” Marc recalled. “The cemetery was 35 miles away in Dubberly, and I think all 4,000 people followed us there. And Mack was unbelievable. I love that man. I couldn’t have made it without him.”

Little did they know that Caren, Cole’s fiancé, was pregnant with a baby girl who would never know her dad. Payton Cole Taylor would later play soccer for SMU, which gave her a full scholarship offer when she was in the ninth grade and is interested in a career in medicine. Caren is married to Adam Doiron, a Longhorn teammate of Cole’s.

Not forgetting 44

That fall, Brown and the Longhorns made sure Cole Pittman was not forgotten. Not even remotely.

Teammate Cory Redding, one of Cole’s best friends, suggested the players wear CP patches on their helmets that 11-2 season. Brown had equipment managers hang Cole’s No. 44 jersey at his locker and even traveled with it to road games. Brown made sure Marc and Judy got Holiday Bowl championship rings from Texas’ 47-43 win over Washington.

Athletic director DeLoss Dodds and the school dedicated the North Carolina game, the second game of the year on Sept. 8, to Cole. Texas flew in the Pittmans, who were given two framed jerseys of their favorite No. 44. One hangs in Marc’s man cave, the other in Evangel’s Cole Pittman Memorial Fieldhouse.

So, too, did the game seem to follow a divine script that sunny afternoon.

Redding, one of the pallbearers, intercepted a pass and returned it 22 yards for a touchdown. Star cornerback Nathan Vashar returned a punt for a touchdown from — you guessed it — 44 yards out.

In the final minute of Texas’ lopsided win, running back Brett Robin broke around left end for a 12-yard touchdown run and a 44-14 lead with 36 seconds to play. Before Dusty Mangum could line up to kick the extra point, quarterbacks Major Applewhite and Chance Mock raced up to Brown and insisted they couldn’t kick it.

Applewhite took the snap and took a knee.

The cheering crowd of 83,106 fans at Royal-Memorial Stadium swelled with emotion and gratitude.

The Longhorns' score would forever remain at 44.

“All of them were holding both of their hands up with 44,” Marc said. “I thought again, this is a God thing. Just a wonderful, wonderful memory.”

'We had to tell this story'

To assist Wangrin in writing the book about Cole, Marc often taped remembrances of his journey with his son. He’d lean against Cole’s marble headstone at Fellowship Cemetery amidst the pine and oak trees and reflect on their too brief time together.

Marc has never stopped going to the cemetery on the anniversary of Cole’s death as well as his birthday on Jan. 26, often spilling crumbs from Cole’s favorite Cotton’s Fried Chicken at the gravesite. They were still lunching together.

Of course, he is a still-grieving father but one who had such a tight bond with Cole and younger son Chase that Marc once drove 14 hours to Austin to see Cole for 10 minutes before turning around and making the trip home to Shreveport.

That’s how deeply embedded the two were in each other’s lives, which is the underlying message Marc hopes the film will convey.

Marc had lost his own father to cancer when he was only 17. Edward Pittman had undergone gall bladder surgery, but once doctors opened him up and saw the damage, they sewed him back up and told him to get his affairs in order. He lived another six weeks. He could be rough around the edges.

“I never heard him tell me he loved me,” Marc said. “But Cole taught me a Jesus kind of love. Love without expectations. When you can honestly do that, that’s when it comes back to you.”

The filmmakers hope to capture all that emotion and pathos and try to complete the project for a release sometime in the fall of 2026.

Hill was sold almost immediately on the idea. He has recently directed the top-five Netflix movie, “You Gotta Believe,” a compelling true story of a rag-tag Fort Worth baseball team that rallied behind its teammate’s terminally ill father/coach to get to the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa.

“I watched the ESPN story, the 10, 15-minute story with Marc. I was in a sauna at a gym, and I broke down,” said Hill, a one-time TCU wide receiver who graduated from Texas State and who has two sons of his own. “It was appealing to me how Marc broke down the generational trauma he had with his father and how he changed his life to love his boys. Then, you have University of Texas football. I mean, it was like a no-brainer.”

Saxton and Pittman met when the former’s State Farm agency sponsored one of the annual Cole Pittman Memorial Tournaments to raise funds for underprivileged kids. The two became fast friends and now talk almost daily.

Saxton and Keffer’s production company worked with Hill on “You Gotta Believe” but they weren’t necessarily looking to launch another sports movie project.

But then Cole intervened.

“This is a love story, a father-son relationship story,” Keffer said, “and we thought we had to tell this story. We want to share Marc’s story and honor Cole.”

Marc Pittman has been approached before about doing a movie of Cole’s life. And he’s grown weary of the disappointment that has followed from broken promises. But he feels differently this time.

He knows it will hurt, painfully so. But he made a promise.

“I feel God’s got his finger on this,” he said. “I just want to honor Cole.”

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/sports/college/longhorns/article/marc-pittman-son-cole-new-movie-20065957.php

[Pwood]

Great write up! I hope they are able to  make the movie happen. 

[Jc Dobbs]

I was in attendance at the "44" game. Back then I had season tickets in Section 26U. My wife and I had close friends Mark and Mary who always drove with us from Dallas to Austin for the Longhorns games.

Mark and his wife Mary were Texas fans through and through. The kind of good Texas Exes we all know and love. Sadly both have since passed away from natural causes. Mary was 43 when she died and Mark was 53. They are both missed by their friends and family. 

Thanks for posting the story about Cole Pittman. I remember him as a great player and an even greater young man who left his mark in the history of Texas football. That "44" game was special, just like he was.

 

 

 

 

[TarrantCoHorn]

I was at the 44 game. That’s the coolest moment at DKR I’ve experienced. 

[Drunk randoke]

I was at the Carolina game.  CooCool rainy day as I recall.  Very emotional.  That was my last semester at Texas.  A couple days later was 9/11.  

[_everyoneshere]

Hope McConaughey is jumping onboard. He was just on twitter talking about wanting the TX legislature to fund more films in state. 

[Huskie1]

I was at that game, cheering and crying at the same time at the end of the game.