Chasing the prize
Dave Wannstedt was there in 1976, when Pitt won its last national championship. Penn State's Joe Paterno arrived six years later and again in 1986.
Now, it could be Rich Rodriguez's turn to take West Virginia to the mountaintop.
The coaches of the three district college football teams are at different stages of their careers. But each has the same goal: win the BCS championship game.
Wannstedt is in his second season as the Panthers' head coach, hoping to rebound from a disappointing debut. Paterno, who will turn 80 in December, recaptured some glory last year with a top-three finish, but he needs to prove it was no fluke.
Rodriguez, the one who has never had a whiff of a national title, could be in the best position to win it this fall. The Mountaineers begin the season ranked No. 5 in the country, and they could be poised for a trip to the title game.
Out of the mines
When you've gone miles into a coal mine, fourth-and-six at the Georgia Dome doesn't seem that far.
Rodriguez has been to both places. He enjoyed the second experience a whole lot more than the first.
"It's not that coal mining isn't an honorable profession, because it is. But boy, it's tough work," Rodriguez said following a fall camp practice at Milan Puskar Stadium.
"You put your life in your hands every time you go in that hole," he said.
Rodriguez knows. He's the son and grandson of coal miners, and the brother of a former mine engineer.
It explains a lot about why he wants to take the Mountaineers to new heights this season.
"I went down there one time, and it's a pretty dangerous thing," the coach said. "Imagine going into a cave, only a lot smaller."
Fast forward 30 years from his dark trip into the mine, and Rodriguez was faced with a fourth-down situation against Georgia with 1:38 remaining and the ball resting near midfield Jan. 2 in the Sugar Bowl.
Finally given a shot at the school's first BCS bowl victory, Rodriguez took it.
Actually, he faked it. Mountaineers punter Pat Bradley dashed 10 yards on the fake punt, and the offense ran out the clock to preserve a 38-35 victory.
Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese called the Mountaineers' Sugar Bowl upset one of the watershed events in conference history.
It also made Rodriguez one of the nation's hottest coaching properties, earned him a new $1 million annual salary, and turned him into the Big East's leading spokesman at the moment.
However, West Virginia center Dan Mozes recalled excitement over the Sugar Bowl victory was subdued quickly. The win came just a day before it was revealed a dozen miners had been killed in the Sago Mine disaster.
"Coach Rodriguez is from a coal-mining family, so when there is a mining accident, it strikes a chord with the whole team," Mozes said. "You're not just playing for your fans, you're playing for the whole state."
When Rodriguez came to West Virginia as head coach before the 2001 season, he brought with him the spread offense. It has propelled the Mountaineers to a 39-22 record in five seasons, along with other perks like three straight Big East titles, three straight New Year's Day bowl appearances, six wins over top-25 teams, and home attendance averaging 94 percent of capacity.
The final hurrah?
Some would say Paterno is back as a college football icon after coaching Penn State to an 11-1 record and No. 3 spot in the final polls last season.
Paterno would tell you he's never been away.
The four losing records in the five seasons that Penn State endured from 2000 through 2004, the stretch that had many questioning the head coach, have receded into history after the triumph of 2005. Paterno, it's been suggested, badly needed that successful season, which concluded with a matchup against fellow coaching legend Bobby Bowden and a 26-23, triple-overtime win over Florida State in the Orange Bowl.
Paterno disagreed.
"I think my family needed it. My wife needed it more than I needed it," he said. " 'Did you hear what they wrote about you⢠Did you read what they said about you?' I said, 'Honey, I don't even look at that.' I don't. You (media) guys are great, and we need you to sell tickets and to get people stirred up. But as far as I'm concerned, you don't know what you're talking about half the time."
Paterno seemed beaten down mentally and fatigued at times last season. But that could have had as much to do with his wife's health issues as the losing record. Sue Paterno had suffered a broken leg during a beach vacation, cutting that short and causing Paterno to miss the first day of Big Ten preseason festivities in Chicago.
This year, Paterno arrived tan and upbeat for that Big Ten event. Still, he's cognizant that he's only a couple of losses away from more criticism.
"The day will come again when it will be 'He's getting too old and decrepit,' " Paterno said.
According to Levi Brown, the redshirt senior offensive tackle who has seen the ups and downs of recent Penn State history firsthand, Paterno has been consistent through it all.
"Joe has always told us to not worry about him, he'll be OK," Brown said. "He's going to be the coach here until he wants to leave, so we really don't focus on that part."
After four decades and nearly 500 games as head coach, the game still is fun for the Brooklyn native.
"I just enjoy the whole thing," he said. "I enjoy everything but this (talking to the media)."
Paterno enters his 41st season as head coach with 354 career wins, second only to Bowden's 359 among Division I-A coaches. Paterno and the legendary Amos Alonzo Stagg are the only two major college head coaches to have served tenures of 40 seasons or more at the same school.
In December, Paterno and Bowden, along with John Gagliardi, will become the first active players or coaches to be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.
"You're at a loss for words to respond to it," Paterno said of the honor. "It's going to be something -- when I'm involved in it, when I'm not thinking about the season -- it's going to be a very important part of my life."
Building for the future
Patience was never one of Wannstedt's virtues, not after winning a national championship at the University of Miami and a Super Bowl with the Dallas Cowboys.
Not after head coaching jobs with the Chicago Bears and Miami Dolphins ended in his firing.
There is simply no time for patience in the NFL.
Wannstedt has proven he knows how to win. What he learned in his first season at Pitt was how to build. Although a 5-6 debut season was not the foundation he envisioned, it taught him the value of time. Wannstedt learned that college and pro football run on different clocks, and he had to operate under the one regulated by the NCAA.
He also learned that it was going to take time -- and patience -- to restore Pitt's program to a level of national prominence.
"I think his biggest adjustment was really the time (management) issue, the amount of time you're allowed to have with the student-athletes," Pitt athletic director Jeff Long said. "I think he went into that with eyes wide open, knowing he was going to have to learn about that. But he probably didn't think it was going to be as big of an adjustment as it was."
Wannstedt also had the unfortunate timing of taking over at Pitt amid high expectations that followed a Bowl Championship Series berth, and missing a bowl berth in the season in which rivals Penn State and West Virginia won the Big Ten and Big East conferences, respectively, and finished with breathtaking victories in BCS games.
But for Wannstedt, it was never about one season. It was never about coaching. If it was, Wannstedt freely admits, he'd still be in the NFL. It is about recapturing the magic of 30 years ago, when Pitt last won a national championship. Wannstedt knows the Panthers are a few years away. They have 12 scholarship seniors, including two kickers. Their depth is precious and their talent is precocious, mostly redshirt freshmen and true freshmen. But Wannstedt is convinced it will happen.
"There's a difference between having a good team one year and having a real good program," Wannstedt said. "My vision and the vision I know the chancellor (Mark Nordenberg) wants and I know (athletic director) Jeff Long wants, is to have a top-10 program. That's the vision we want for this."
Last season proved it wasn't going to be an overnight transformation.
"He has to look at it from the big picture, because he's the head coach," said senior linebacker H.B. Blades, whose father, Bennie, played for Wannstedt at the University of Miami. "He's going to be running this program for a while. After we're gone, he has to coach the guys that are still here. He has to think of now and the future."
To do that, Wannstedt is channeling Pitt's proud past. He has extended an olive branch to alumni, welcoming them back to the program. The Panthers will celebrate the anniversaries of three national championships this season, and Wannstedt wears a ring to celebrate the 1976 title. Wannstedt has been able to sell Pitt to recruits not just because he played there, but also because he returned to the Panthers after reaching the highest levels.
"Dave's the right guy for the job at the right time," said Jackie Sherrill, who coached Pitt from 1977-81 and visited here last month. "He knows what it takes. He's got great feelings for Pennsylvania kids, being one of them."
Now 54, Wannstedt brings the energetic enthusiasm of someone who landed his dream job and the experience of a coach in his seventh stop on the coaching carousel. He wants this to be the last, but not until it's time.
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