DETROIT (10/21/2022) -- The University of Detroit Mercy Department of Athletics is in mourning following the news that former football and track standout Wally Gruber '50 passed away on Oct. 19 at the age of 94.

Gruber played football and ran track at the University from 1946-1950 and was twice named the Student-Athlete of the Year and received the Scallen Medal as the top senior student-athlete in 1950. 

He graduated magna cum laude with a degree in mathematics and would go on to a long career as an aerospace engineer with the Bendix Corporation, designing elements of guidance and navigation systems for some of the missiles that eventually powered the Mercury and Apollo astronautical and lunar missions. Some of his work remains officially classified. After retiring from Bendix he served as a professor of mathematics at Mercy College of Detroit and Detroit Mercy.

In football, he was a running and defensive back under head coach Chuck Baer and helped the team to a 4-0 record in the Missouri Valley in 1949 to win the conference title. He rushed for over 800 yards in his career and held the school record with a 97-yard touchdown against Villanova in 1948, which was also the longest in the nation. 

In track and field, he won 46 of 56 races in his time in the 220 and 440-yard dashes. He held the U-D outdoor records for the 100 (9.8), 220 (20.8), and 440 (48.8)-yard dashes and was the anchorman on the mile relay record (3:22.6), while also topping the track team in points during the 1948 campaign. He nearly made the 1948 Olympic Team, claiming fifth in the finals for the 220-meters at the Olympic Trials as his final heat saw him pull a muscle that dropped him to fifth. 

He was inducted into the school's Hall-Of-Fame in 1983. 

A memorial service for Gruber will be held on Saturday, Dec, 10, at Our Lady of Fatima Church in Oak Park (Coolidge between 9 Mile and 10 Mile) with a Mass of the Resurrection at 11:00 a.m., preceded by a gathering in the antechamber.