CHARLOTTE - Cal football general manager and 1983 Golden Bears' consensus first-team All-American linebacker Ron Rivera was presented with the 2025 Bronko Nagurski Legends Award on Monday evening at the annual Bronko Nagurski Awards Banquet held at the Charlotte Convention Center. Rivera was previously selected as the recipient of the honor in February in an announcement made by the Charlotte Touchdown Club and the Football Writers Association of America.

"I am honored and humbled to be chosen as the recipient of the Bronko Nagurski Legends Award from the Football Writers Association of America's 1983 First-Team All-America Defense," Rivera said at the time. "Playing for the University of California, Berkeley, was a privilege, which led to many other tremendous opportunities. I appreciate the Football Writers and the Charlotte Touchdown Club for hosting the Bronko Nagurski event."

The Bronko Nagurski Legends Award recipient each year is a player chosen from a past FWAA All-America team. The FWAA and CTC have presented the Nagurski Legends Award since the 2007 season. Previous recipients include such standouts as Notre Dame's Alan Page, Michigan State's Bubba Smith, Miami's Ted Hendricks, Florida's Jack Youngblood, Maryland's Randy White, Ohio State's Tom Cousineau, UCLA's Jerry Robinson and Texas' Johnnie Johnson.

Rivera racked up the honors as a 1983 senior at Cal when in addition to his consensus All-America status he was selected as the Pac-10 Co-Defensive Player of the Year and earned the Pop Warner Award as the top senior on the West Coast, to name a few.

Rivera was selected in the second round of the 1984 NFL Draft by Chicago and would go on to play nine seasons in the NFL all with the Bears from 1984-92. He was on Chicago's 1985 team that defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XX.

After his playing career, Rivera spent four seasons in broadcasting before taking on his first coaching job with the Bears in 1997 as a quality control coach. After two seasons in the role, he moved on to become the Philadelphia Eagles' linebackers coach for five seasons (1999-2003). He returned to Chicago as the team's defensive coordinator (2004-06) before spending four seasons in San Diego as linebackers coach (2007) and defensive coordinator (2008-10).

Rivera's first head coaching job came with Charlotte (2011-19), with which he was named twice the Associated Press NFL Coach of the Year (2013, 2015) with the latter squad playing in Super Bowl 50 at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara. He was also an NFL head coach for another four campaigns in Washington (2020-23) before returning to his alma mater California as the program's general manager in March of 2025.