PSR In Depth
Sideline Homecoming
Coaches Feel Drawn To Their Roots
By Joe Bendel

The coaching world can be as fluid as the Nile, a never ending passage with more twists than Bob Vila's screwdriver.

"You never know where you'll end up in this profession," former Pitt football coach Johnny Majors said.

One day it could be Columbus. The next it could be Akron or Anchorage or Arkansas.

It's a vocation that's sent Steelers coach Bill Cowher to three different outposts, Majors to five, Rich Rodriguez of West Virginia to six and former Pitt basketball coach Ben Howland to six, as well.

The common denominator among that group is that all eventually returned home to coach the franchises or schools they grew up rooting for.

In some instances, they returned to the organizations for which they played.

Local Heroes

"It's an honor to be asked back," Majors said. "It's a draw on you emotionally and on your ego. You get a chance to rebuild the fortunes of a program that is important to you. As Thomas Wolfe said, 'You can never go home again.' Well, I did go home again and had a lot of excitement doing it."

It took Majors 20 years in the coaching ranks before returning to the University of Tennessee, his state school and alma mater, where he finished as a runner-up for the Heisman Trophy in 1956.

He left a national-championship-winning program at Pitt in 1976 for a chance to coach in Rocky Top country. His introductory press conference at Tennessee drew more than 100 media members.

Cowher canvassed the coaching circuit for well over a decade before that memorable day in 1992, when Dan Rooney gave the Crafton native the keys to his hometown team. The city was abuzz in Cowher's rookie year when he led the Steelers to an 11-5 record and a division title. He had them in the Super Bowl in '95.

Howland, meantime, left the elevating Pitt basketball program behind in April to get back to his California roots at UCLA, and Rodriguez saw a successful career as an assistant take him to his "dream job" in Morgantown with the hometown Mountaineers, for whom he played from 1981-84 and once worked as a graduate assistant.

No Place Like Home

"Not to sound funny, but there's no place like home," Howland said. "You work long and hard with the hope that you can fulfill a dream and go back to where you came from. I'm living out a dream. I'm near my family. I'm around my friends. And I'm coaching at UCLA. It's probably the only job I would have left Pittsburgh for. I had a great situation, but this was too good to pass up."

Howland has already assembled a strong recruiting class for next season and has the Bruins playing hardnosed, defensive basketball, as he did in his four successful years at Pitt.

He is looking to revitalize his hometown team, just like Cowher has done with the Steelers, who've been to three AFC Championship games and a Super Bowl, and like Rodriguez is doing with WVU, which won a share of the Big East Conference title in his third season this fall.

Majors guided Tennessee to a 116-62 mark, with three Southeastern Confer-ence championships and a 7-4 bowl record in 16 seasons before returning to Pitt for a four-year stint from 1993-96.

"You want to get the job done for the people who have supported you throughout your life," said Rodriguez, the Big East Coach of the Year in 2002 and 2003. "There's nothing like being on that field on Saturdays in front of your extended family."

Natives Grow Restless

That said, it's not always best to go home. Majors felt uneasy about leaving the Pitt program behind, even though he was headed back to his roots. He had rebuilt things quickly after arriving in 1973, turning Pitt into a national powerhouse and, ultimately, a national champion.

He made countless friends in the city, not to mention good money, and received carte blanche treatment anywhere and everywhere he went. He has said on many occasions that he might have been hasty in signing on the dotted line at his alma mater.

He eventually felt less welcome at Tennessee, and, several of his colleagues turned on him. He was forced to resign, and his departure was bitter, even though he is one of the most revered heroes in the history of Tennessee athletics.

"I wanted to stay in Pittsburgh more than I wanted to go to Tennessee, but I had a chance to be closer to my family - my mother and father and three brothers. It was intriguing, but we would have won a lot more at Pittsburgh. There were possibilities of other national championships at Pittsburgh.

"But with all that being said, I had great times and it was exciting rebuilding the Tennessee program. We were the winningest team in the SEC my last five years and went to four major bowl games in six years. But I was undercut and lied to the day before I went into heart surgery (in '92). Until my ignominious demise - when I was knifed in the back by the present coach and some administrators - it was a great run."

Majors' ousting prompted former Pitt athletic director Oval Jaynes to say this about Vols fans: "Sometimes you have to be more than 100 miles from home before you are considered an expert."

To a lesser extent, Cowher is discovering that the hometown fans don't always see a local as a hometown hero. The natives are getting restless with his team, particularly since the Steelers will miss the playoffs for the fourth time in six years.

Howland has already been booed at UCLA's Pauley Pavilion, where national championships are expected.

Difficult Decisions

Former Steelers' assistant Chan Gailey said going home is not right for everyone. He coached at the collegiate and pro levels for 26 years, including a two-year stint with the Dallas Cowboys as head coach, before heading back to Atlanta to coach Georgia Tech two years ago.

"First, you have to understand and decide what's important to you," Gailey said. "Coming home and being around the people at home have always been vital to me. These opportunities just don't come up very often, so when they do, you have to react quickly. If you pass on the chance to go back to where you started, you might never get that chance again. Part of you feels like you owe it to the people from your home state to come back. And part of you thinks you owe it to yourself. Some people pass up on the chance and regret it. Some know it would have never been the same.

"You need to make sure it's going to be a comfortable setting for you and your family. Just like anything, it has to be the right thing for all involved. This was what was best for me. The timing was right and we were able to take advantage."

Skip Prosser, a Carnegie native, passed up on a chance to coach at Pitt when Howland left to stay at his current post at Wake Forest.

"It's all about timing," Prosser said. "Sometimes, it's perfect. And sometimes, it doesn't work out. I made the decision based on what I thought was best for my family and my career. You make choices, and you just hope you don't regret them."

Joe Bendel covers college sports for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.