There are celebrated college football mascots like Cowboy Joe V, the University of Wyoming’s Shetland pony that trots around the field after scores, or Ralphie, University of Colorado’s buffalo that charges out of a chute to lead the players onto the field.
But there’s one four-legged friend that unexpectedly burst into the hearts of all college and pro football fans about three years ago — Ben, the golden retriever.
Ben, the beloved dog of college and NFL football analyst Kirk Herbstreit, died Thursday after an eight-month fight with leukemia and lymphoma. He was 10.
The death of the amiable, amber-colored dog that traveled with Herbstreit to games, often sneaking into frames and sabotaging segments by demanding pets from broadcasters, was a top trending topic on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday under the hashtag #RIPBen.
“The college football world lost an icon today,” tweeted the sports website Deadspin. “RIP Ben Herbstreit.”
The Barstool Sports site dedicated to Colorado State University athletics posted a gif of Snoopy lying in the rain in memory of Ben. Countless social media accounts posted videos of Ben, typically rolling over on football fields for belly rubs or attention — even on the hallowed midfield emblem at University of Alabama’s Bryant-Denny Stadium.
Cheyenne Animal Shelter Director Britney Tennant said Ben’s death is felt by so many across the nation because dog owners share their most intimate selves with their pets, and that experience is one that’s universally understood.
“We feel these things very, very deeply, and then that experience is sort of universally shared,” she said. “And so when a person loses a pet like that, especially one other people have become familiar with, we feel it like it was our own deeply personal loss because the amount of empathy that we have is profound, and it's empathy that we don't practice or feel in other settings, so we don't know how to process that emotion, and it just flattens us when it happens.”
Ben also shared many common traits with most dogs. He loved “any food,” according to Herbstreit. He did not have one favorite toy, but a “bunch of stuffed animals.” He was a retriever with no desire to play fetch.
“He’s too lazy to be a retriever,” his owner said.
On Set
The first game Ben traveled to was a Top 10 matchup between Oregon and Washington universities a few seasons ago.
He attended “College GameDay,” the popular pre-game show, captivating college students who had camped out at the set all morning, stealing the spotlight from the analysts trying to predict the game’s outcome. Out on the field during pregame warmups, he sat calmly watching players practice field goals and punts.
“His reaction and how much fun he had, I just started bringing him after that,” Herbstreit said.
Wherever Ben went, football programs tried to one-up each other by giving Ben special VIP credentials and gifts. The Atlanta Falcons gave him the position of “wide retriever” while Penn State University most recently gave him a pass that labeled him the game’s “treat analyst.”
“We’re so lucky we got to meet you, Ben,” tweeted the Texas Longhorns official account along with a video of Ben wagging his tail while staring at Bevo, the program’s mascot, an intimidating, massive and stoic longhorn steer.
Two days after one of the most polarizing presidential elections in modern history, Ben’s death cut through partisan divisions for many, unifying fans of bitter rivals in collegiate athletics or otherwise.
“The presidential election and now this,” tweeted @pameladyer. “It’s turning out to be a really rough week! RIP Ben.”
The Fight
Herbstreit had kept Ben’s fans updated on chemotherapy treatments Ben was receiving.
Earlier this week, he posted that Ben was not responding to treatments, had lost the use of his back legs and had stopped eating. Thursday, he posted a photo of him hugging Ben in a golf cart when he announced the dog’s passing.
“This is really hard to write,” he wrote on X and Instagram. “We found out today the cancer had sprad througout Bens organs and there was nothing left we could do – we had to let him go.
“I’ve had dogs my whole life but Ben was 1 on 1. He was smart-loving-gentle-patient-inquisitive-and welcoming to all. Always a big smile and a soft tail wag. He and I could communicate.. He and I understood each other and had each others backs.”
Herbstreit has said he began bringing the dog to work with him in fall 2021 to keep him company during a stressful stretch that included the hospitalization of his son for a heart condition.
“So sorry, brother,” wrote ESPN anchor Scott Van Pelt, whose on-air goodbye to his dog Otis a few years ago became a viral post. “I truly am.”
Within the Cheyenne Animal Shelter, Tennant said, strong animal-human bonds are not something shelter workers try to minimize or downplay. They’re something Tennant said she wants to cultivate within people so that the capacity for empathy grows within them.
What people feel toward animals, Tennant said, are feelings that can and should be shared between each other. That is what makes Ben’s death so profound. People across the nation are pausing to express sympathy and shared grief together – “a great unifier in that way.”
“I really fundamentally believe that one of the greatest things about the work that we get to do at the animal shelter is teach people what it's like to feel empathy for something in the hope that maybe they'll take that feeling out into the world and expand it to other relationships that they have with other living beings or other interactions in the community and with animals,” Tennant said.
“The reason that Ben is in the headlines after this is because people want to feel good about something, and even though they are sad that the dog died, feeling empathy and kindness and compassion for the dog and his owner feels good and we don't get enough of it,” Tennant added.
In an X post Thursday afternoon, Herbstreit said all the well-wishes meant a lot.
“My phone hasn’t stopped ringing for the last 3 hours from texts and tweets about my boy Ben,” he wrote. “I’m truly overwhelmed by how many people he touched-and from the bottom of my heart thank you for sending your best wishes and letting me know how much you loved him.”
Cowboy State Daily Editor Jimmy Orr contributed to this report.
Justin George can be reached at justin@cowboystatedaily.com.
