Steve Tasker
Football
Induction Year: 2017
Leoti, Kansas native Steve Tasker spent his high school years playing football in the fall and running track in the spring for the Leoti High School Indians, where he would help Leoti to the 1980 State Track and Field Championship while winning a total of four gold medals.
Following his high school playing days, Tasker would find himself on campus in Dodge City where he would spend the 1981 season's donning the purple and gold and looking for a chance to play at the next level.
Utilizing his speed and agility, Tasker would start for the Conquistadors during his only year on campus and managed to be named first team All-KJCCC selection at flankerback and pick up honorable mention All-KJCCC honors on special teams. His abilities saw Tasker end up with an offer to attend Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois where Tasker would spend the next three years.
Used primarily as a kickoff and punt return specialist, Tasker spent the 1982-84 seasons with the Wildcats while leading the team in kick return average in 1982 (24.1 yards per return which is still a Northwestern record) and punt return average in 1982, '83, and '84.
Following graduation with a degree in communications studies, Tasker would be drafted in the ninth round (226th overall) by the Houston Oilers where he would spend the 1985 and 1986 season with the team. The Buffalo Bills would then claim Tasker off waivers, where he would spend a majority of his 13-year NFL career.
A seven-time pro-bowl selection, Tasker is still the only special teams player to ever be selected as a Pro Bowl MVP (1993) and is a five-time All-Pro selection while helping the Bills to an NFL record four consecutive Super Bowl appearances (1991-94).
Tasker would finish his NFL career with 51 receptions for 779 yards and nine touchdowns while averaging 20.7 yards per kickoff return. On the other side of special teams, Tasker would be used primarily as a gunner where he made 204 special teams tackles and had seven blocked punts and was voted to the NFL's All-Time team as the special teams player.
Since retiring from the NFL, Tasker has taken on the role of serving as a game analyst for NFL broadcasts on CBS and served as a reporter for coverage of Super Bowls XLI, XLIV, and XLVII. After being inducted to the NJCAA Hall of Fame in 1995, Tasker would be inducted into the Greater Buffalo Hall of Fame in 2001 before going on to be inducted in the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame in 2005 and enter the Buffalo Bills Wall of Honor as the 24th person on September 9th, 2007.
Tasker and his wife Sarah have five children, and currently reside in East Aurora, New York just outside of Buffalo.
