George Yarno, a Spokane native who played for Jim Walden at Washington State from 1975-78, died of stomach cancer Monday afternoon.
Yarno, 58, was a defensive lineman for the Cougars before he became an NFL player and coach. He went underrated in 1979, but signed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as a free agent. Yarno later returned to his alma mater as an assistant coach under Mike Price from 1991-94. He also coached for a year at Idaho.
Yarno became an NFL assistant coach in 2008 and his final stop was in Jacksonville, where he coached the Jaguars’ offensive line in 2014 and 2015.