Dempsey proud to give name to run

Jennifer Holmes Arizona Daily Wildcat Women softball head coach Mike Candrea (left) and Cedric Dempsey talk before the start of the Cedric Dempsey Cancer Center Run yesterday on the UA Mall. The 16th annual event raised money to fund UMC cancer center's research.

The Cedric Dempsey Cancer Center Run, held yesterday on the University of Arizona campus, attracted about 3,000 runners, walkers and in-line skaters.

The 16th annual event raised money to fund UMC cancer center's research. The total amount raised this year will not be tallied until January.

Dempsey, a former UA athletic director who in 1987 was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's B-cell lymphoma, said the UA cancer facility is responsible for curing him. In 1994, he took over as president of the National Collegiate Athletic Association - a position he still holds.

"I owe my life to the center," said Dempsey, who handed out awards to race winners at the event.

Melissa Schiffman, one of the Arizona Cancer Center's event coordinators, said the run featured five events: a 10K challenge race, 2-mile fun run, a wheelchair race and 2-mile and 10K in-line skating courses.

"All of the money raised goes to the center - this is one of the main sources," Schiffman said.

The Arizona Cancer Center treated Dempsey for about half of the 10 years he served as athletic director - from 1984-94.

Although chemotherapy treatments worked well for him, the cancer came back several times before going into full remission, he said.

"It was a slow-acting cancer," Dempsey said.

He went through four years of chemotherapy, in combination with an experimental drug regimen.

"My doctors decided regular chemo just wasn't holding me - I was potentially going to lose my kidneys," Dempsey said. "I needed something stronger and we agreed on this one."

The experiment consisted of more intense chemotherapy treatments and taking verapamil, which previously had been used as a heart medication.

"This drug broke down cancer cells so the chemo would directly work on permeating the cells," Dempsey said.

Dempsey's cancer had spread throughout his entire body and was impossible to treat with surgery.

When he took the director position, Dempsey said the UA's athletic department had its own problems.

"We were in financial difficulties - $450,000 in the red - and the football team was on probation," Dempsey said. "The morale was down."

Dempsey worked to improve the department's financial situation, build new facilities and remodel existing ones.

"We added on to the football stadium, improved seating in the McKale Center, new practice fields and tennis courts, put in a new track (and) developed recreation space," Dempsey said.

He also hired UA men's basketball head coach Lute Olson and men's football head coach Dick Tomey, among others.

In addition to improving the department, Dempsey also founded the Commitment to an Athlete's Total Success personal development program.

The CATS program's purpose is to develop and improve athletes in social and academic areas, Dempsey said.

"It's been a model copied throughout the country - the NCAA has 240 organized 'life skills' programs," he said.

Dempsey worked as a teacher, coach and administrator at the UA for about 15 years.

He said a UA coach's job description was somewhat different in 1962, when he started out.

"Back then, the athletic and the physical department were combined," Dempsey said. "Most coaches had teaching responsibilities."

He taught and coached at the UA from 1962-1966, the latter half of which he spent as assistant men's basketball coach.

Dempsey left the UA and worked as athletic director at three other universities before he and his wife returned to Tucson in 1984.

"Arizona has been home to us, we spent ... some of the happiest days of our lives," Dempsey said. "The people I've worked with have become life-long friends."

He held the NCAA's voluntary secretary-treasurer position a year before the executive director position opened up. The position's title was recently changed to president.

"We had not expected to leave Arizona," he said. "It was hard for us to leave, yet I felt it was a professional call."

Before Dempsey's bout with cancer, the cancer center run was named after former UA men's football head coach Larry Smith.

Dempsey said he is proud to have his name associated with the cancer research fund-raiser.

"This the most successful program in the country run by students," he said. "I have the opportunity to have people with cancer or family members of cancer patients call and talk - that is the most rewarding."

Irene Hsiao can be reached via e-mail at Irene.Hsiao@wildcat.arizona.edu.