RUSTON, La. (AP) — Eddie Robinson, who sent more than 200 players to the NFL and won 408 games during a 57-year career, has died. He was 88.

Super Bowl MVP quarterback Doug Williams, one of Robinson’s former players, said the former Grambling State University coach died shortly before midnight on Tuesday. Robinson was admitted to Lincoln General Hospital Tuesday afternoon.

“For the Grambling family this is a very emotional time,’’ Williams said Wednesday. “But I’m thinking about Eddie Robinson the man, not in today-time, but in the day and what he meant to me and to so many people.’’

His older records were what people remembered: in 57 years, Robinson set the standard for victories, going 408-165-15. John Gagliardi of St. John’s, Minn., passed Robinson and has 443 wins.

“The real record I have set for over 50 years is the fact that I have had one job and one wife,’’ Robinson said.

He had been suffering from Alzheimer’s, which was diagnosed shortly after he was forced to retire following the 1997 season, in which he won only three games. His health had been declining for years and he had been in and out of a nursing home during the last year.

Robinson said he tried to coach each player as if he wanted him to marry his daughter.

He began coaching at Grambling State in 1941, when it was still the Louisiana Negro Normal and Industrial Institute, and single-handedly brought the school from obscurity to international popularity.

Robinson is survived by his wife Doris, son Eddie Robinson Jr., daughter Lillian Rose Robinson, five grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.