Mel Triplett, 71, a member of the New York Giants 1956 championship football team who was one of the most successful players to come out of the University of Toledo, died yesterday in Arbors at Toledo nursing home.

He suffered from diabetes and gangrene, his sister, Lesten McEl|roy, said. He had been a patient in nursing homes since February.

A fullback, Mr. Triplett played seven seasons with the New York Giants and was a star on the 1956 team. "He was probably the most successful ballplayer ever to come out of the university," said Sey|mour Rothman, a retired Blade staff writer who covered UT football during those years.

After that championship game, in which the Giants blasted the Chicago Bears 47-7, Giants coach Jim Lee Howell lauded Mr. Triplett and said, "Without Triplett's blocking, a lot of our plays wouldn't have worked.''

He was named the Giants top offensive player in the game.

Mr. Triplett was drafted by the Giants in 1955 in the fifth round and stayed with the team until 1960 and then was with the Minnesota Vikings in 1961 and 1962. At 32, he joined the Cleveland Browns in 1963, but was eventually cut.

In his professional career, he rushed for 2,857 yards and 14 touchdowns in 97 games.

His number at the University of Toledo - 66 - was retired by the football program in 1955. The jersey was re-retired during a special halftime program last year and was to be permanently displayed in the Larimer Athletic Complex on campus.

He received first-team All-Mid American Conference honors in 1954 and was inducted into the university's Varsity T Hall of Fame in 1983.

He was a 6-0, 220-pound fullback and defensive tackle, averaging 5.9 yards and 5.2 yards per carry in 1953 and 1954, respectively. His top game was a 186-yard day in a 38-7 rout of Bowling Green in 1954.

He could block too.

"He was strong. He was powerful," Mr. Rothman recalled.

Mr. Triplett's grandson Keith, who is a junior guard for the Rockets, said in 1999 he attended UT because of his grandfather. "He wanted to keep up with our family history and go to the same college his grandfather attended," Mr. Triplett's daughter, Teresa Triplett-Smith, said at the time.

Mr. Triplett was inducted into the Greater Toledo Athletic Hall of Fame in 1964.

After his football career, he was employed at Buckeye Brewing Co. in the 1960s and the federal Comprehensive Employment and Training Act program in the 1970s.

He was born in Mississippi, the second of what would become 12 children in the family. There were only three boys, and two became professional football players. His younger brother, Bill, spent 11 years in the National Football League with the St. Louis Cardinals, Giants, and Detroit Lions.

The family moved to northeast Ohio when Mr. Triplett was young. His father gave up working on farms in the south for a job in Youngstown-area steel mills.

Mr. Triplett graduated from Girard (Ohio) High School.

He once told Mr. Rothman that he planned to return to Girard and go into politics.

Instead, he came back to Toledo, and off the football field, he often struggled. He was divorced twice. In 1976 he was convicted of forgery charges stemming from his time as a supervisor of the federally funded employment program.

A New Year's Day fire in 1964 routed Mr. Triplett and his family from their Detroit Avenue home. Many of his football souvenirs and scrapbooks were destroyed.

On Easter morning of the previous year, he suffered a gunshot wound in his left hand during a quarrel with his then-wife Gladys. He refused to have her arrested.

Surviving are his daughters, Renee Green, Teresa Smith, Angel Masie, Gladys Jean Triplett, and Gwen; sons, William "Bo,'' Walter, Sylvester, Calvin, Theodore, Aaron, and Alton; sisters, Mary Brown, Lesten McElroy, Syphfronia Garrett, Amelia Murray, Lillie Crawford, Maxine Cato, Jacquelyn Miller, and Ruth Darlene Grayer; brother, Bill Triplett; and several grandchildren.

Day Funeral Home is handling arrangements, which were not final last night.

First Published July 26, 2002, 4:08 p.m.