PEORIA — Courtland Tubbs was a multi-sport star who deserved a place on Manual's figurative Mount Rushmore of athletes.

"One of the greatest athletes ever in this building," said Dan Fauser, former football head coach at the Peoria high school.

"And an even better person," former Manual athletic director Tim Kenny said.

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But Tubbs became a monumental loss to the Manual athletic family when he died at age 48 on Thursday after years of battling health issues. He gave everything he had to Manual as an athlete, then more as a coach, where he was still at the baseball team's helm.

"He was a soft-spoken kid," Fauser said. "He came here from Oklahoma. I never heard anybody say anything bad about him. A great athlete, a better person.

"I remember his dad was a Vietnam vet and in construction and he would come down to the school and lift weights with us. He instilled that work ethic in Courtland."

How good was Courtland Tubbs?

In the 1993-94 season at Manual, Tubbs earned Journal Star Player of the Year honors in football. And Journal Star Player of the Year honors in baseball. And in between, he was the seventh man on the Rams basketball state champions under legendary coach Dick Van Scyoc.

Tubbs remains the only male athlete from the Journal Star area to be named Player of the Year in two team sports. For an encore, he went on to Indiana State University and played both football and baseball.

"Incredible that he could do that," Fauser said. "But that's how good he was. He had an impact at Manual not many guys have had. The man has a trophy case down there at Manual dedicated just to him. Everything he achieved is in there."

Tubbs dressed as a freshman football player at Manual and played quarterback and cornerback. Fauser remembers he had a 70-yard TD run that first year. He was the starter by his junior season.

"We knew he was up-and-coming from Day 1," Fauser said. "He and Brandun Hughes were my cornerbacks, best two corners I've ever seen at that level. He had tremendous acceleration as a quarterback, too."

Growing up Manual

Tubbs moved to Peoria at a young age from Oklahoma and grew up on Ann Street, right next to Manual High School.

“Manual has been a foundation for me ever since I've been able to walk or talk," Tubbs said in a 2010 Journal Star story. "I lived less than a block from the school, so I was always trying to get involved in things going on at Manual. It's been with me all my life. Everything I did revolved around the high school and the activities they had going on.

“Being from a low-income neighborhood, it’s not easy. You have a lot of different obstacles to climb. I have to thank my parents for showing me how to be successful. A lot of kids I grew up with didn’t have that."

FROM THE ARCHIVES: Catching up with Manual great Courtland Tubbs in 2010

Tubbs graduated in 1994 and went on to Indiana State, where he earned a degree in construction technology and served as a project engineer for Hunt Construction Group. He worked on major projects in Indianapolis and Detroit, and compiled estimates for materials needed for construction of the St. Louis Cardinals new Busch ballpark.

"A fantastic athlete," Kenny said. "He did things that had never been done. But he was a better kid, too. And that was more important than being a good athlete. People just loved him. He played on some really great teams here.

"Later on, though, he had those extensive health issues."

How Tubbs battled kidney issues

Tubbs started having kidney problems in high school. By the time he was in his second year at Indiana State he needed a kidney transplant. His sister, Kelli Nelson-Smith — donated her kidney and he had the transplant performed in January of 1998.

His body later rejected the kidney, he went on dialysis, then underwent another transplant in 2009.

Those health issues ended the rising star's career at Indiana State. Tubbs was competing for the starting QB job there. He eventually shifted to receiver. On the baseball team, he was an outfielder. As a receiver, Tubbs was selected to the league's all-newcomer team and led the Sycamores in touchdown catches for two seasons.

He also is one of two players in Indiana State history to run for a touchdown, throw for a touchdown, catch a touchdown pass and hit a home run.

"That may be the most hurtful part of it all, the fact I got so close," Tubbs told the Journal Star in 2010. "Everybody's dream is to make it to the pros. Everything was lining up for me. I was doing well at each level each year and getting better. I was on a few (baseball) scouts’ rosters, with ‘Injured’ next to my name. I think I could have made it in either one."

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Tubbs spent years on dialysis and was said to have a heart issue, too. But the former three-sport athlete never stopped being part of Manual's teams.

He served as an offensive coordinator under Fauser on Manual's football teams. He was an assistant coach for the Rams' basketball team for eight years. And he was hired as head coach of the baseball team in 2016, a position he still held the day he died.

"He was just a great kid," Fauser said. "It's just a shame he had to live more than half his life in a health situation with his kidney.

"It was great to have him as a player, great to coach with him, and even greater to know him as a person."

Dave Eminian is the Journal Star sports columnist, and covers Bradley men's basketball, the Rivermen and Chiefs. He writes the Cleve In The Eve sports column for pjstar.com. He can be reached at 686-3206 or deminian@pjstar.com. Follow him on X.com @icetimecleve.

This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Former Peoria Manual, Indiana State athlete Courtland Tubbs dies