When you think of great defensive linemen at the University of Illinois, the name Moe Gardner is one of the first players you think of.

Gardner, who was a three-time All-American selection while at Illinois from 1988-90, went on to play for the Atlanta Falcons in the NFL from 1991-96. Gardner joins fellow former Illini football players Kevin Hardy and Ray Nitschke as the latest players to be enshrined in the Fighting Illini Athletics Hall of Fame Class of 2020.

Although Gardner is humbled with the accolade of being named to the Hall of Fame class, he credits a bigger picture reflecting on the time that he was at Illinois and some of the players that suited up alongside him to make each other better.

“It’s always exciting as a player to be recognized that way, but it’s less for me as an individual as opposed to some of the guys that I played with while I was a member of the Fighting Illini”, Gardner said via teleconference last week “Guys like Howard Griffith, Mel Agee, Jeff George and Chris Green were some of the guys that came in around the same time that I did and helped in the development of the football program.”

Known mainly for their linebackers, Illinois really hasn’t had a lot of stellar defensive linemen during the era that Gardner played, but under coaches such as Mike White, John Mackovic and Lou Tepper, they helped make Gardner the player that he was.

“Coach (Lou) Tepper was a guy that I really enjoyed playing for, and I remember Coach Mackovic saying that he was a very stand-up guy,” Gardner said. “Playing with Darrick Brownlow, who I went to high school with at Cathedral High School in Indianapolis, was very special to me as well, and the fact that we all redshirted together, it grounded us and made us better to see that entire class sit out and I think it really benefited us as a result.”

Gardner, who stayed in the Atlanta area upon retiring from the league in 1996, went back to school to get his master’s degree in Library Science at Clark Atlanta University, one of the more renowned Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) in the nation. After obtaining his degree, he got a job at the Auburn Avenue Research Library in suburban Atlanta as a research librarian, and according to Gardner, the position has enabled him to reach out to a lot of the black athletes of yesteryear.

“I took some African-American classes while I was at Illinois, and it piqued my interest, so some of what I do is help academic researchers get information on such events as the race riots of the south and the March on Washington,“ Gardner said. “At our library, we do a program on Jackie Robinson every year around the anniversary of his entry into Major League Baseball, and a couple years ago we did a program on Curt Flood, and although many people will not know who that is, he was one of the first black players to veto a trade to another city.

Gardner has been married for nearly 30 years and he has four children and one granddaughter, who sometimes lives with them. He says that his home is a lively one and that keeps him young at heart and always striving to make sure that his family is well-taken care of.

Regarding the upcoming NFL draft, which will be held virtually for the first time in the event’s history, Gardner had some thoughts on that, since he was an NFL draftee at one point, but wasn’t personally on-site like some of his teammates were.

“Guys like Kevin (Hardy) and Simeon (Rice), that was their thing, being at the draft and walking across stage when they were drafted. I remember being in Champaign the night I was drafted, so I participated in my draft virtually,” Gardner said.

The official Hall of Fame induction is scheduled for Friday, Sept. 18, at State Farm Center when the incoming class will be honored in an event that is free and open to the public. In a change to the annual Fighting Illini schedule, the induction ceremony will fall on Varsity I Weekend when all former Illini are invited back to campus.