It will be an emotional return for San Jose State football coach Brent Brennan when the Spartans play Hawaii this Saturday at the Clarence T.C. Ching Athletic Complex.

In May, his cousin — former University of Hawaii quarterback and 2007 Heisman Trophy finalist Colt Brennan — died.

“This game will be an emotional deal for me because that’s still pretty fresh for all us,” said Brent Brennan, who began his coaching career as a graduate assistant with the Rainbow Warriors in 1998. “Everybody is still really missing him. And, so, I think he’s the kind of guy that’s not going to soon be forgotten.”

During a Zoom call with reporters on Monday, Brennan recalled having football as a bond with his younger cousin. When he was a UCLA receiver, Brennan would sneak Colt into the locker room. “And then when I got into the coaching thing, even when he was playing in high school, he’d come up and spend a couple days with me in San Luis Obispo and watch practice and sit in the meetings,” Brennan said. “That was always special, he and I sharing the football thing.”

As an SJSU assistant coach, Brennan was 0-3 against Colt-led Warriors.

“He beat me every time,” Brennan said. “But it was always special to give him a hug at the end of the game and just to see what he had become as the player and the person. And how the islands had just embraced him. And what he meant to them, and what they meant to him.”

Brennan said the family is honored that the Warriors are wearing “15” — Colt’s jersey number — on their helmets this season.

“It’s been really special,” Brennan said. “He loved that place. He loved the people there. (The sticker has) been a really nice thing for the family. But I think everybody wishes Colt was still around.”

On Saturday, San Jose State and Hawaii will be competing for the Dick Tomey Legacy Trophy. Tomey was a head coach for both teams. Following the Spartans’ victory last year, the trophy resides in the SJSU’s athletic complex.

“I walk by it every day, and it makes me smile,” Brennan said. “It makes me think he’s looking at me, telling me to be more diligent about coaching this or coaching that, or too many offside penalties in the last game, or whatever. I can hear his voice as I walk past the trophy every day.”

Tomey died in 2019.

“A tremendous human being,” said Brennan, who was an assistant coach under Tomey. “Everything that’s good about college football and coaching, that was Dick Tomey.”

Brennan also is looking forward to playing at the Ching Complex, which was retrofitted to host Division I football games. Aloha Stadium has been declared unfit to host spectator events because of structural concerns.

“I GA’d there a hundred years ago, and that was our old practice field,” Brennan said of the facility formerly known as Cooke Field. “You’d have all the grandmas running around the track in the morning when you’re practicing. It looks really cool on the Internet. I’m excited to see what it looks like in person. With what they’ve been able to do in a short time to get that facility up to speed to host a Division I football game, that’s a real cool part of it.”