Robert Gallery ‘very honored’ to join other Iowa football greats in College Football Hall of Fame

IOWA CITY — After Robert Gallery was done with an appointment and was in his vehicle, he received a call from Iowa sports information director Steve Roe and “wondered what he wanted.”

But Roe did not need anything from the former consensus All-American and Outland Trophy recipient.

Instead, Roe was calling to inform Gallery that he was named to the 2023 class of the College Football Hall of Fame.

“I was kind of thrown back,” Gallery said this week on The Gazette’s Hawk Off the Press podcast. “I knew I was on the ballot, but that’s about all. So to get that call, it turned out to be a pretty exciting day.”

Gallery said he was “very honored” to receive the Hall of Fame recognition.

“This is the ultimate individual accomplishment,” Gallery said. “Not that I did it myself. Obviously it took great coaches and great teammates for me to get to this position to be eligible and to receive this award.”

Gallery, 42, has received plenty of accolades before this week’s Hall of Fame announcement, but he said earning this honor “at this point in my life” has added meaning.

“You never really had time to sit and reflect and enjoy some of those other awards because I was always working to be better and to go to the next step and do the next things,” Gallery said.

Gallery now is in elite company as the 11th Hawkeye to be named to the College Football Hall of Fame as a player.

Following the official ceremony in December 2023, Gallery will join Andre Tippett, Larry Station, Chuck Long, Alex Karras, Cal Jones, Aubrey Devine, Gordon Locke, Duke Slater and Nile Kinnick as inductees.

“Obviously some legendary names on there, so to have my name thrown in with there’s, I’m thankful and humbled,” Gallery said. “It still hasn’t quite set in.”

Gallery, his wife, former Iowa women’s basketball player Becca McCann, and three children now live in the Lake Tahoe area of California.

Iowa is not as far metaphorically from the Gallery household, though, as it is geographically.

“We watch a lot of Iowa football and a lot of Iowa women’s basketball here in our house,” Gallery said. “It’s pretty special to share that with your children.”

You can hear the full conversation with Gallery on this week’s edition of the Hawk Off the Press podcast, which is available on YouTube, Twitter, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Stitcher.

Comments: john.steppe@thegazette.com