BY MIKE MURPHY
Sports Information Director/Cal State San Bernardino 

    To a man, teammates of former Cal State San Bernardino soccer player Hugo Bustamante praised him as a man with not only a passion for his sport but a passion for life, faith and family. 
    To say they were stunned by Bustamante's death at the hands of a co-worker who gunned him down inside the outpatient pharmacy at Long Beach Memorial Hospital last week would be an understatement. 
    “What happened to Hugo blows my mind and I can only feel for his wife and kids,” said Bret Baker of Yucaipa, who played with Bustamante from 1985 to 1987. 
    Jerry O'Hara, close friend with Bustamante and his family since their playing days at CSUSB, said the death of his compadre was not only devastating to him personally but to the Bustamante family – the parents, Hugo and Carmen, the brother and two sisters. 
    “He was the gem of the family,” said O'Hara. “He was the glue that held everybody together.” 
    Robert Beeman, a San Bernardino pharmacist, played with Bustamante for four years at CSUSB. “Hugo would give you the shirt off his back. He was always a peace-maker, a genuine good guy who was very tight with his family, a devout Catholic.” 
    Barry Molton, an 18-year-old freshman in 1984 when Hugo, then 21, befriended him as the inaugural season of Coyotes soccer began. “We looked to him for leadership. He was a real straight-laced guy who was mature beyond his years and he had a great sense of humor.” 
    Todd Mapes, a freshman on the 1987 team in Bustamante's senior season, remembers him as “a true team player. He was always positive and encouraging his teammates. I was a young guy and he was very supportive.” 
    Bustamante, 46, was a member of the 1987 Coyotes team under Coach Carlos Juarez that went 16-3-3, captured the NCAA Division III West Region title and advanced to the NCAA semifinals before losing to Washington University of St. Louis, 1-0, on penalty kicks in Greensboro, N.C., 
    In the process the team became the first CSUSB athletic team to reach an NCAA Final Four in just the fourth year of the program's existence. 
    He scored three goals and was credited with five assists in his Coyote career as a defender. Two of his assists came against Whittier on Sept. 29, 1984. 
    Bustamante, a Sierra Madre resident at the time, graduated from St. Francis High School in 1980 and attended Glendale College where he attracted the attention of Cherif Zein, who was the first head coach for men's soccer at CSUSB in 1984-85. 
    Zein recruited Bustamante to Cal State and he played on the 1984 team that went 11-2 in its first year of existence. Juarez took over the men's soccer program in 1985-86. 
    Bustamante graduated from Cal State San Bernardino with a bachelor of science degree in 1988 and went on to earn a degree in pharmacology at University of Southern California in 1993. 
    He and his wife, Jane, and their daughter, Ashley, 10, were active in youth soccer programs in Cypress and he had planned on coaching his four-year-old son, Dominic, this year. 
    Other friends of Bustamante described him as “the epitome of kindness and grace, an eternally patient man,” according to the Long Beach Press-Telegram. 
    It was Beeman who encouraged Bustamante to look at pharmacy as a profession after his friend was denied admission to medical school after graduating from Cal State. 
    Both entered the USC School of Pharmacy a year apart – Robert in 1988 and Hugo in 1989 and they graduated a year apart – 1992 and 1993. Their circle of friends at USC included Bustamante's wife Jane. 
    “Hugo and I hit it off pretty well the first year at Cal State. The team was a mixture of kids from Highland and the Pasadena area. We got a lot of leadership and guidance from Hugo because he was older,” Beeman recalled. “He and Mark (Texter) were like assistant coaches to us. We didn't goof around in those days. We were focused on soccer and school. Hugo got good grades.” 
    Molton recalled the day in 1984 when the Coyotes team played the first home NCAA soccer match ever on campus, defeating University of Redlands, 4-3, then traveling to Occidental to defeat the Tigers 4-2 later the same day. 
    “Hugo's family invited the team to their house and served us lunch and we spent the afternoon with them,” Molton recalled. 
    Beeman said that Bustamante has not changed since his collegiate days. “He was no different today than he was in college. He was solid in the community. His family came first in his life – the same as it was 20 years ago in school,” Beeman said. “He was just an outstanding person and friend.” 
    O'Hara has enjoyed a close relationship with the Bustamante family since graduating from Cal State.
They were teammates on a semi-pro team coached by Bustamante's father, a former professional soccer player in Peru. 
    “Our families took vacations together and those vacations are among my fondest memories of Hugo,” said O'Hara. 
    Just recently, when O'Hara and his current wife were expecting their first baby, Hugo and his wife, Jan threw a surprise baby shower for them. Hugo later came out to Riverside to check on the family and the baby when the baby required hospitalization shortly after birth. 
    O'Hara, who still holds team single-season and career records for goals scored and assists, recalled his relationship with Bustamante began when the two were teammates at CSUSB. 
    “I was a big forward (6-feet, 190 pounds) and he was a defender (5-9, 160 pounds) so in practice we'd butt heads and fight with each other. He was very competitive and a tough soccer player and he stuck up for his teammates.” 
    He said the two were inseparable off the field and roomed together on road trips. 
    “We played a card game called Stages (a contract game similar to rummy) with the other guys and we were both undefeated,” O'Hara said. 
    Baker remembered Bustamante as a “really friendly guy and a great teammate. I came in a week late my freshman year and Hugo opened up to me right away, telling me he was glad I was there.” 
    Along with managing the outpatient pharmacy at Long Beach Memorial, Bustamante was part-owner of a Charro Chicken restaurant in Cypress and helped coach his daughter Ashley's AYSO soccer team, the Cypress Cyclones. 
    The Cyclones made local and national headlines and the television news last month when they helped raise funds to help a team that had beaten them in the AYSO sectional playoffs advance to the state tournament in Sacramento. 
    The team was scheduled to be honored by the Los Angeles Dodgers Women's Initiative Network and its “Community WINners” program at Dodger Stadium before a game on April 18, but on Thursday, as their head coach prepared to distribute tickets to the team, they learned that Bustamante, father of one of their players, Ashley, was killed and the appearance was postponed. 
    Kelly Hales, a co-worker in the hospital pharmacy, was also killed in the incident and the gunman, Mario Ramirez, described as a pharmacy technician at the hospital, committed suicide after killing Hales and Bustamante. 
    Long Beach Police say they are trying to determine a motive for the shootings.