A member of the famed 1971 Cal rugby tour Down Under, a successful businessman, Builder of Berkeley, UC Berkeley Trustee and, since 2011, the Chairman of the California Rugby Advisory Board, Irving Lyons III has always been in the middle of it.
 
"It is no exaggeration to say there might not be a Cal rugby without Bud's leadership," Cal head coach Jack Clark said. "His chairmanship has been profound and the amount of work he has put into Cal rugby is almost incalculable. Many hours some days and an hour or so most days, adds up to thousands of hours of servant leadership from Bud. It is difficult to describe our gratitude in mere words."
 
Bud, as he is called, is one three brothers, all Cal graduates and the second in a three-generation Cal tradition that includes his aunt and uncle; wife, Mary, also Class of '72; and their daughters, Jennifer (Class of 2004) and Katherine ('02).
 
As a rugby student-athlete, Lyons bound onto the front row of the scrum wearing the No. 2 Blue and Gold jersey, earning three varsity letters and a selection to the team's trip to Australia and New Zealand during the summer before his senior year. And, as CRAB Chairman, Lyons has helped to ensure the continued existence of the oldest intercollegiate sport at Cal in partnership with the University.
 
Lyons arrived at Cal in the fall of 1968 as a gridiron player from Redwood High School in Marin. Several of his fraternity brothers mentioned rugby as a sport that might fit the 195-pound freshman footballer, but it was Jim "Truck" Cullom, his Cal freshman football coach, who sold Lyons on the idea of trying rugby for the first time that spring.
 
Cullom was a United States Marine in World War II, Korean War veteran and two-sport student-athlete at Cal who played in two Rose Bowls before being drafted by the Washington Redskins. Also an assistant under rugby head coach Miles "Doc" Hudson, Truck told Lyons he had the stuff to succeed in rugby.
 
Lyons had never seen a rugby game before joining the team, but quickly ended up in the middle of the scrum at the hooker position. "I'm really not sure how I migrated to hooker other than physical size probably had something to do with it," he said. "Being in the middle of everything was appealing."
 
The Bears went 8-3 in the spring of 1969 as Lyons earned his first varsity letter as a freshman. Cal beat Stanford again for the Scrum Axe the following year and took a successful tour of Hawaii to cap the 1970 campaign. Then, in July of 1971, after a moderately successful spring, Lyons and his teammates joined the ranks of Cal rugby lore on a six-week tour of Australia and New Zealand.
 
Lyons summarized the opportunity: "Someone comes to you when you're a junior or senior in college and says, 'Hey, how does this sound for the upcoming summer? You and 23 of your best friends are going to go on a six-week tour of Australia and New Zealand, and play rugby, all expenses paid except for a minimal contribution. How's that sound?'"
 
The brainchild of Doc Hudson, a New Zealander who had taken the 1965 Bears on a successful trip Down Under, the tour for Lyons and his teammates staked the 1971 team as one of the best in program history. Cal beat Queensland University in Ballymore Stadium and Australia Capital Territories (ACT) in Canberra, and came home with a 5-4 record. The 1971 Cal rugby tour will celebrate its 50th anniversary in July 2021. 

"Arriving there, we had no expectations whatsoever," Lyons said. "We played some great rugby and just had a fabulous time. It was remarkable and will stay with us forever. I look at my circle of friends today and a lot of my close friends were because of rugby and it continues on, 50 years later."
 
After graduating from Cal in 1972, Lyons proceeded to earn his MBA at Stanford. In his first year on The Farm, he found himself suiting up for the Cardinal against Cal in Memorial Stadium.
 
"That was interesting, to say the least," said Lyons, who moved over to the Old Blues Rugby Club, which had just formed, during his second year at business school.
 
After receiving his MBA, Lyons worked from 1974-79 for Wells Fargo, leaving to form King & Lyons, a San Francisco based industrial real estate development and management company for which he was Managing General Partner. Joining him there a few years later would be former teammate Ned Anderson, the captain of the 1971 tour who later, as head coach, guided Cal rugby to four straight national titles from 1980-83.
 
"As a teammate, Bud was a fierce competitor who could always be counted upon to give his all," said Anderson, who was inducted into the Cal Athletic Hall of Fame in 2011. "As a fellow CRAB member, I continue to appreciate his determination to serve the program."
 
Their firm merged into an existing private REIT called Security Capital Industrial Trust and the name of the company eventually became Prologis, which went public on the New York Stock Exchange in 1994. The largest owner of industrial property in the world, Prologis remains one of three public companies upon whose boards Lyons sits.
 
Just as Anderson had played for his predecessor, Doc Hudson, before becoming head coach, the Bears had a similar template for the transition plan for what would be only the fifth head coaching change in Cal rugby's now-139-year history.
 

Anderson hired Jack Clark, one of his former players, as an assistant coach in 1982. Anderson remained on staff as an assistant coach after Clark took the helm in 1984. The Cal Rugby Forever giving campaign kicked off in 1985, the same year the Bears earned their first national title under Clark.
 
"We knew that there was a legacy there," Lyons said of the coaching change. "Ned had done a hell of a job getting the program its first national collegiate championships. Jack Clark was on his staff and there was a succession plan that looked like it would work pretty well. In retrospect, it worked extremely well."
 
While Clark and the Bears would go on to win 20 of the next 25 national collegiate championships, part of an ongoing body of achievement that stands at 33 overall national titles, Bob Witter Sr., one of 14 Witters to play rugby at Cal, helped to establish CRAB in 1990. Rugby became increasingly financially self-sustainable with dedicated facilities, breaking ground on construction for the multi-million-dollar Witter Rugby Field in 1993 and hosting matches there since 1995. Over 120 major donors helped to construct the Doc Hudson Fieldhouse in 1996, to include former Chancellor and Nobel Laureate recipient Glenn T. Seaborg, after which Wise Plaza, named in honor of former Cal rugby man Dennis Wise, and the Jim "Truck" Cullom bench were dedicated in 1996 and '97.
 
"There is a lot of pride in the fact that rugby stepped up and funded the construction not only for Witter Rugby Field, but also Doc Hudson Fieldhouse," Lyons said. That tradition of giving extended beyond the rugby pitch in ensuing years, with rugby stakeholders substantially contributing to the Simpson Center for Student-Athlete High Performance, including the Bud and Mary Lyons Rugby Locker Room.
 
All along, alumni have maintained a robust annual funding of the program, raising significant amounts for the annual account while further endowing the sport on campus.
 
"What that tells you is that there is a highly motivated group of individuals who really put their money where their mouth is, and the program has been meaningful to that group of successful people," Lyons said. "They're paying it forward and that's great."
 
Lyons' additional support of campus includes his role as a UC Berkeley Foundation trustee and member of its Capital Allocation Committee, assisting the foundation in its stated mission "to assure its place as a preeminent global institution by encouraging private philanthropy, providing leadership and serving as an advisory council and steady source of assistance to Berkeley's Chancellor and to the campus as a whole." Within athletics, beyond being a major donor to rugby and football, he has also long been an active member of the San Francisco Grid Club, which supports Cal football.
 
In September of 2012, Lyons and other major rugby stakeholders emerged with an agreement with the University to ensure rugby's continued home in Intercollegiate Athletics. 

"An administration often makes decisions that outlive its tenure. But for alumni, they never go away," Lyons said. "That's why you want to nail everything down as best you can. It's kind of difficult sometimes. But my association is permanent and everlasting, and I will be there in support for as long as I'm on the earth."
 
Lyons said Clark deserves much of the credit for the work that led to that agreement. "If he had not gotten as personally involved as he did, the result never would have been as successful as it was," he said.
 
The Bears went on to win five straight national 7s titles from 2013-17, and in 2018, following successful fundraising initiatives that include Cal Rugby Forever, the Next 100 Years of Cal Rugby and the Every Man Pledges campaign, the team announced the formation of 15 new California Positional Rugby Endowments. Among the first eight of those positional endowments to be announced was the Irving F. "Bud" Lyons III Rugby Hooker Endowment.
 
Never to remain complacent, Lyons continues to look above and beyond his service as CRAB Chairman, having steered the program through the rough seas. The essence of his plan is to stay engaged.
 
Composed of 44 members including its chairman, CRAB is one of the most prestigious boards on campus, with members from all sectors of professional life. Their mission, together and in smaller working groups, is to advise and advocate for Cal rugby.
 
"CRAB was established by Bob Witter, and with Bob's energy, it was materially a one-man show," Lyons said. "We've been able to expand it with tremendous participation and talent with members whose accomplishments speak for themselves. It's a productive and successful group of men who care deeply about rugby and their University."
 
Lyons also reiterated his appreciation for his partnership with coach Clark.
 
"Jack is unique for a lot of reasons. He's a hell of a coach, as we all know, but he's a deep thinker," Lyons said. "There's a long-term perspective with the idea of, where do we want to be in the future? The decision you might make for a short-term fix might not be the right one for the long-term gain. He's very thoughtful about how he approaches that."
 
As Bud Lyons remains devoted to the projects that keep Cal rugby pointing forward, he also has three grandkids who could represent a future generation of Golden Bears. That might keep Bud right in the middle of it.