The Charleston Gazette Wrote:South Florida dealing with football staff defections
July 24, 2007
By Dave Hickman
Staff writer

MORGANTOWN — Remember the angst you felt as a West Virginia football fan last winter when it seemed like most of the Mountaineer coaching staff was jumping ship?

There was offensive line coach Rick Trickett bolting for Florida State.

Recruiting coordinator and tight ends coach Herb Hand left for Tulsa.

Wide receivers coach Butch Jones became the head coach at Central Michigan.

And that doesn’t even touch on Rich Rodriguez’s dalliance with Alabama.

Well, it could have been worse. You could have been a South Florida fan.

In a span of mere weeks the Bulls lost nearly half their coaching staff. When four assistants jumped ship it raised to six the number of coaches Jim Leavitt lost in just the past year.

And to make matters worse, half of this winter’s departures ended up at Big East rival West Virginia.

But Leavitt — like Rodriguez did when his staff started falling apart — pretty much took it all in stride. It comes with the territory.

“There’s always going to be someplace else where the grass is going to seem greener,’’ Leavitt said last week during the Big East’s annual media day in Newport, R.I. “Whether it’s because of money, location, geography, opportunity or whatever, the grass is going to be greener. I don’t think you can just say it’s because of money.’’

Leavitt’s Bulls have seemingly arrived on the Division I landscape, and in quick fashion. A program that wasn’t even born until 1997, the Bulls are suddenly one of the darlings of the game, having beaten Louisville and West Virginia in the past two seasons and now owning the program’s first bowl win.

But success comes with a price and in Leavitt’s case it has been a turnover in staff. As recently as the 2005 season there were still four coaches remaining from that first staff photo in 1997. Now there is only Leavitt.

Among the most recent departures were line coach Greg Frey, who was a graduate assistant on that first staff, and Rod Smith, who had been with the program for six years, most recently as the offensive coordinator for the past two years.

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USF also lost defensive line coach Bernard Clark to Florida International and wide receivers coach Lawrence Dawsey went to Florida State. A year earlier Leavitt lost the last two full-time assistants from his original staff when Earl Lane went to LSU and Rick Kravitz jumped to North Carolina State.

The loss of Smith and Frey to West Virginia has to be especially irritating to Leavitt because he’s worked so hard to get USF to this level and managed to pull off an upset of major proportions last November by beating the Mountaineers in Morgantown. Yet the Mountaineers are still considered the more elite program, at least in terms of national respect.

But Leavitt can rationalize the moves of Smith and Frey.

“Rod certainly didn’t just go for money. He went back to West Virginia,’’ Leavitt said, referring to Smith’s roots in Pendleton County and his ties to Rodriguez, for whom he played quarterback at Glenville. “And Greg didn’t go because of money. He went because he’d never been anywhere else. He told me flat out, ‘I’ve never had another job, Coach. I’ve been here 11 years. In my lifetime I want to experience something else.’ ”

Whether or not Leavitt managed to adequately fill in the gaps remains to be seen. To replace Smith as offensive coordinator he promoted tight ends coach Greg Gregory, and to replace Frey he elevated graduate assistant Mike Simmonds. He also hired fired Iowa State head coach Dan McCarney to coach the defensive line and brought back Mike Canales — a member of the original staff — as wide receivers coach after Canales was part of the staff fired at Arizona.

“Do I feel like it worked out pretty good? In hindsight, yes,’’ Leavitt said. “It was as good a transition that could have happened. I’m not saying the guys we have now are better coaches than we had. Those were good coaches. But it was as smooth as it could have been.’’

The addition of Smith and Frey, by the way, brings to three the number of former Leavitt assistants on the West Virginia staff. Running backs coach and offensive coordinator Calvin Magee was also a member of that original USF coaching staff in 1997.

“I never really like to lose coaches, but I know it’s a part of the deal,’’ Leavitt said. “I’ll lose some this year, next year, all years.’’

To contact staff writer Dave Hickman, call (304) 348-1734 or send e-mail to dphickman1@aol.com.

While I am not a proponent of one BE school stealing coaches from another BE school, I am glad that the really good assistants are still somewhere in the BE.

I am also happy that Leavitt was able to replace his poached staff with some really good coaches and former staff members. But this kind of turnaround is usually not good for a program and its continuity.

For years we lost many asistants due to lower pay. That was addressed in Leavitt's last contract which increases the asst coaches pool money yearly. While we are probably still towards the bottom of BCS squads,it is improving. I think that these recent loses as Leavitt says were not money related.

All BEast schools need to stop being the minor league for other conferences. Until that happens, we'll always be perceived as second class citizens.

Of course, that takes money, which requires fans to show up - and wealthy boosters donating the big bucks. But fans showing up for games is the biggest need for many BEast schools right now - other than UofL and WVU.

I don't think it will be a problem in New Jersey this year. Rutgers grabbed the attention of the greater NYC area - and they'll hold onto it this year with another good team.

Now all we need is for the rest of the conference to step up to the plate.

how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

All that crap in the cow field provides them with a great fertilizer.

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

Don't UCiF fans have their own boards?

CyberBull Wrote:

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

Don't UCiF fans have their own boards?

Who really cares? If you just ignore 'em they'll get tired of all the non-attention.

No is the gnat swarming season. See how full of them this board has become.
Time to fumigate again

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

The last two years UCiF has been buried in the "BULL PATTIES"....

as long as leavitt stays at usf i don't see any major continuity problems. wvu got a good coach in frey, clark and dawsey weren't with the team for very long and most fans couldn't stand smith as the oc. i think we rebounded as well as we could've hoped for.

Agree
I think Frey is a good coach and its good for him to have other places in his resume.
Smith never fit well at USF and was heavily criticized. Some things were not his fault but i think others were. Is he a good coach? not sure i can answer that one.

bitcruncher Wrote:

CyberBull Wrote:

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

Don't UCiF fans have their own boards?

Who really cares? If you just ignore 'em they'll get tired of all the non-attention.

IMO it's easier for you to ignore b/c it's not every WestVirginia related thread getting hijacked.

USFMike Wrote:as long as leavitt stays at usf i don't see any major continuity problems. wvu got a good coach in frey, clark and dawsey weren't with the team for very long and most fans couldn't stand smith as the oc. i think we rebounded as well as we could've hoped for.

Actually I think we came out ahead after the dust settled.

I was highly critical of the turnover but anytime you can add a defensive mind like Coach McCarney to your staff it adds to your program. McCarney over Clark is a swap I would take anytime, Dawsey was a good recruiter but Coach Douglass has not skipped a beat in recruiting Jacksonville for USF. Coach Canales should be a more than adequate on the field coach for our WRs and will benefit from Canales's NFL and PAC10/ACC coaching experience.

The only significant loss IMO was Coach Frey. Anytime you lose an original coach there is going to be a transition. However, Coach Simmonds has a lot of experience as a Top High School in Florida and he played OL in the NFL.

CyberBull Wrote:

bitcruncher Wrote:

CyberBull Wrote:

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

Don't UCiF fans have their own boards?

Who really cares? If you just ignore 'em they'll get tired of all the non-attention.

IMO it's easier for you to ignore b/c it's not every WestVirginia related thread getting hijacked.

I can guarantee you that if a USF fan were allowed to be a moderator on this board, this crap would come to an end. Sadly, I don't think Georgia Tech Swagger has any intention of doing that, though.

USFFan

bitcruncher Wrote:

CyberBull Wrote:

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

Don't UCiF fans have their own boards?

Who really cares? If you just ignore 'em they'll get tired of all the non-attention.

It would be nice to have the ignore option back.

CyberBull Wrote:

USFMike Wrote:as long as leavitt stays at usf i don't see any major continuity problems. wvu got a good coach in frey, clark and dawsey weren't with the team for very long and most fans couldn't stand smith as the oc. i think we rebounded as well as we could've hoped for.

Actually I think we came out ahead after the dust settled.

I was highly critical of the turnover but anytime you can add a defensive mind like Coach McCarney to your staff it adds to your program. McCarney over Clark is a swap I would take anytime, Dawsey was a good recruiter but Coach Douglass has not skipped a beat in recruiting Jacksonville for USF. Coach Canales should be a more than adequate on the field coach for our WRs and will benefit from Canales's NFL and PAC10/ACC coaching experience.

The only significant loss IMO was Coach Frey. Anytime you lose an original coach there is going to be a transition. However, Coach Simmonds has a lot of experience as a Top High School in Florida and he played OL in the NFL.

we'll have to see, on paper it looks like we came out on top. dawsey was popular with the players but i always had mixed feelings about his ability to coach. to a lot of people losing rod smith is addition by subtraction. and bernard clark was not a good fit for the program. canales was a good hire and i like the fact that former head coach Mccarney is on staff but i don't see either staying too long. simmonds is a question mark. larry scott can recruit and is an ex usf player but is green in terms of coaching. jury's out on gregory he was a head coach but i believe he ran an option minded offense at army, we'll see how comfortable he is running the spread.

CatsClaw Wrote:

bitcruncher Wrote:

CyberBull Wrote:

goodknightfl Wrote:how could the grass be greener than in a cow field... in summer growing season in fla...???

Don't UCiF fans have their own boards?

Who really cares? If you just ignore 'em they'll get tired of all the non-attention.

It would be nice to have the ignore option back.

Ain't that the truth!!!

bitcruncher Wrote:

CatsClaw Wrote:It would be nice to have the ignore option back.

Ain't that the truth!!!

Click on User CP
Click on Buddy & Ignore List on the left, towards the bottom
Type in the name on the right, click "Update"

Its not the old easy way to do it, but it works.

Nice! Thanks CollegeCard!