Kalsu was born an Oklahoman and grew up watching the streak that Bud Wilkinson built. It wasn’t a surprise that when Wilkinson offered him a chance to play for the Sooners in 1963 he jumped at it.

The Del City, Okla., native played the next four seasons on new OU Head Coach Chuck Fairbank’s offensive line, earning All-America honors in 1967 and making holes for Heisman-trophy-winning running back Steve Owens.

“Any time that he was the right offensive tackle I was praying that I would have a chance to run behind him,” Owens recalled. “Any time you ran behind Kalsu there was a hole there. He was a great player.”

Fellow offensive lineman and 1969 All-American Ken Mendenhall remembered the leadership qualities Kalsu displayed in the trenches.

“He evaluated every block that I made. If I didn’t deliver on a double team I heard about it on the way back to the huddle. I had a coach on the field telling me when I was underperforming, underachieving, not getting done what I should. I had great, great respect for him.”

But football wasn’t the only activity Bob made time for while in Norman. He was also active in ROTC and was Owens’ leader there as well, serving as a Cadet Colonel. During his time with ROTC, Kalsu committed to serve his country by doing two years of service in the military if his name was ever called.

Jan Kalsu, then Jan Darrow, knew Bob was her future husband the first time she met him. They met on a blind date set up by one of her friends from high school and had an immediate connection.

Her fondest memory of Bob playing football came at a football game during Bob’s senior year when the Sooners played Kansas. A win against the Wildcats would ensure OU a berth into the Orange Bowl. The couple had planned to get married after season and had the perfect honeymoon spot in mind.

“I thought, since neither one of us had money, “Well, I will go get myself a ticket for the Orange Bowl and we will get married before and then use that as our honeymoon,” Jan recalled. “That’s what we were excited about, so we went and beat Kansas, and I tore off the 66th row, and back then they would let you on the field and I tore out on that field and he was waiting for me. He picks me up and we are twirling around kissing.”

Unfortunately for Jan, Fairbanks caught wind of the plan and wasn’t happy about his star offensive lineman using the bowl trip as a honeymoon. Jan didn’t get to make the trip and ultimately sat at home addressing wedding announcements.

“He (Fairbanks) and I have laughed over that story over and over again,” Jan said. “We would talk about that, and I would say, ‘I couldn’t believe you would do that!’”

Oklahoma went on to win the 1968 Orange Bowl, 26-24, over Tennessee on Jan. 1, and Bob and Jan married less than a month later. Bob interviewed with the Dallas Cowboys and the Denver Broncos, but never heard back from either team once they found out he had a commitment with ROTC. When the couple came back from their honeymoon, Jan recalls her sister singing, “Buffalo Bob, won’t you come out tonight?” Bob had been drafted early in the eighth round by the Buffalo Bills.

Bob moved to New York, leaving a pregnant Jan behind with what would be their first daughter, Jill.

“When they go as rookies the spouses don’t get to go, and in February we got pregnant with Jill,” Jan said. “So, when I finally got to go to Buffalo with him I was about five months pregnant. I remember, first of all, he made it. He said the scariest part was they didn’t tell you and you just opened your locker and if your jersey wasn’t in that they cut you.”

The rookie started nine games for the Bills during the 1968 season and was said to have a very bright future in the NFL. But Bob got a call at the end of the Bill’s season that would alter his plans.

“He’s playing and he had signed a two-year commitment with ROTC to do two years (of military service),” Jan explained. “And they called him up telling him that there are ways to get you out of that, but Bob was really kind of a man of his word and he said, ‘No, I signed the papers that I would do two years with service and I am not going to back out of that.’ That was the way he was.”

Bob and Jan spent his first year of service at Fort Still in Lawton, Okla., but he was then assigned his final year in Vietnam. Jan recalls going to the tabernacle to pray after learning his orders.

“I said, ‘Jesus, if you feel that you need Bob more than I do, at least give us a son to carry on the Kalsu name.’”

Immediately after Bob’s departure Jan learned she was pregnant. She was jarred after remembering her prayer.

In that day and time, there were no ultrasounds, and on July 23, 1970, Jan gave birth to Robert Todd Kalsu. But later that morning, her nurses and doctors had gotten word that a soldier had been to her parents’ house and was on the way to the hospital.

“My doctor came in and told me, ‘Jan, a soldier is going to be here to talk to you.’ And I just said, ‘Dr. McCoy, Bob’s died hasn’t he?’ He just put his arm around me and held me tight and now that I reflect back on it I noticed that he motioned to the nurse to let the service man come in.”

Bob Kalsu became the only American professional athlete to die in the Vietnam War. He would never know he was the father of a son.

“He (the soldier) was doing the regular sentences they say and I was kind of in shock, so there weren’t tears,” Jan remembered. “The soldier was crying.”

But before Jan could leave the hospital, she had one final mission – Change the name on her son’s birth certificate to James Robert Kalsu Jr.

Fast forward 45 years, and OU women’s golf head coach Veronique Drouin-Luttrell sat in a meeting at the 2015 Women’s Golf Coaches’ Association about a new program called Folds of Honor. The WGCA partnered with Folds of Honor and encouraged collegiate teams to create a golf bag with a fallen soldier’s name embroidered on the front that would be carried by whoever was in the team’s No. 1 lineup spot in each tournament.

Drouin-Luttrell has always encouraged her team to give back to the community, from spending time at the OK Kids Korral or volunteering with other worthy causes, but she knew this was the perfect way to give back while still playing the sport her team loved.

The team started the program last season and was connected with Air Force Technical Sergeant Paul Daniel Harman, a native of Rochester, N.Y., who passed away in a non-hostile incident in the United States. But this year, Drouin-Luttrell wanted someone her team could feel more connected to.

“We were looking this summer for a soldier to represent and my husband, Evan, said he grew up hearing about Bob Kalsu,” Drouin-Luttrell explained. “I was able to get in contact with his wife, Jan, and had a short conversation with her, and she was very excited and honored that we wanted to represent her husband this season. I was glad we could find someone who is part of our OU family.”

Drouin-Luttrell presented the idea of representing Kalsu to her players by having them watch a 20-minute film over his life, and the team immediately knew they had found who they were looking for.

Junior golfer Hannah Wood started out the year carrying the bag as the squad’s No. 1 spot and said it was special knowing she was displaying the name of a soldier on her bag that once wore the same colors she did.

“It enriches the tradition and culture of what OU is,” she said. “It’s an honor more than anything. I’m Sooner bred. I love OU and I know he did too. I know a lot of the football players, coaches and staff know what his legacy was, and I take that into account no matter what I do. It hits home for me. I never had anyone in my family who was part of the military but I think it’s just an honor to carry his name on our bag and represent his family and what he stood for.”

As collegiate student-athletes, many of the golfers dream of one day being a professional athlete, just as Bob was. So with every drive, every chip and every putt, the Sooners honor a man who gave up the life so many athletes dream of to honor his word and serve the United States of America.

“Obviously, as a student-athlete, your sport is a really big thing to you,” said Julienne Soo, a sophomore who carried Kalsu’s bag in the final fall tournament. “You want to do the best you can. He really got to that level and pushed himself to the NFL, which is the pinnacle for football. But then to drop everything and serve your country is a big deal. It’s a really selfless act to drop everything that you’ve been pushing for to fight for someone else and for a greater cause.”

Drouin-Luttrell knew there were many lessons her team could take away from Bob’s story. Whether it was courage, honoring commitments, or just being grateful to our military men and women for our every-day freedoms, she wanted her team to feel changed by Bob Kalsu’s life.

“I think this is an eye-opener to the girls,” she said. “I want them to understand the kind of man we’re representing and realize that there are so many people out giving up their lives so that people like us can go out and enjoy a round of golf. As we continue this program of representing fallen soldiers I think our players will understand better and better the sacrifice these men and women make and being even more thankful for it.”