4 November 2008

After smatterings of national media attention focused on Mike Leach and his graduate coaching education last week, the Texas Tech head football coach and United States Sports Academy graduate's team upset No. 1-ranked Texas and then leapfrogged several national powerhouses to move from No. 7 to No. 2 in the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) ratings.

The nation saw the red-and-black clad student body and fans storm the field after sophomore wide receiver Michael Crabtree took a 22-yard pass at the sideline, turned inward and fought off two Longhorn tacklers for the game-winning touchdown with one second left on the clock. The students and fans caused the team to take two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties for such enthusiasm, but what the players can control is their own destiny in pursuit of the school's first-ever national championship in football.

But the back story was the thousands of coaches and athletic administrators around the world who saw the president of their graduate alma-mater's alumni association score the biggest victory of his unusual coaching career.

In his ninth season in Lubbock, Texas, Leach has had a program that has won consistently - eight straight bowl appearances and a 74-37 record, compared to 58-46 in the nine seasons prior to his arrival. But the 9-0 start the Red Raiders have now is the first for Tech since 1938 and the victory over the nation's No.1-ranked team is also a first in Lubbock.

Leach had no coaching experience, outside of youth league baseball, prior to his arrival in Daphne in 1987 and he has not been quiet about the fact that he learned to coach on the Gulf Coast 20 years ago. In a letter he wrote to the Academy in 2003, when he was the institution's Alumnus of the Year, he credited his studies towards a Master of Sport Science (M.S.S.) in Sports Coaching for helping in his rapid advancement in the field.

How rapid?

He graduated Brigham Young University in 1983, having not played football at a school known for running a passing offense similar to Leach's. Leach, now one of only four Division One Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) head coaches to not have played college football, chose to attend Pepperdine University's school of law, where he graduated in the top third of his class.

"My father always hated lawyers, so I guess that was a rebellion thing," Leach told radio talk show host Collin Cowherd on ESPN radio.

His decision to go into coaching came after law school. Many who know Leach will say that he can talk about anything, from Winston Churchill to Pirates to Howard Stern. Apparently the excessive and diverse knowledge makes it harder for one to choose an occupation, and he later admitted he only intended to coach for 2-3 years.

He started with a one-year stint at Cal Poly San-Luis Obispo (1987), while working on his master's at the Academy. He then coached one year at College of the Desert in Palm Desert, Calif. and a season in the European Football League in Pori, Finland.

Hal Mumme, then head football coach at Iowa Wesleyan, hired Leach as offensive coordinator and line coach in 1989, and he coordinated an offense that led the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) one season and finished second the other two of Leach's three-year stint.

Mumme and Leach teamed up again at Valdosta (Ga.) State, where Mumme's favorite offensive mind led an offense that broke 66 school records, 22 conference records and seven national records in 1993, and another 80 school, 35 conference and seven national records in 1994. Leach was named NCAA Division Two Offensive Coordinator of the Year by American Football Quarterly magazine in 1996.

Mumme made his debut in Division 1-A (Now Division One FBS) at the University of Kentucky, and again tapped Leach to run his offense, and the basketball-by-reputation institution suddenly saw a football team explode all over the Southeastern Conference football record books.

Then-Florida defensive coordinator Bob Stoops took notice. Having felt like the Wildcat schemes were the most difficult x's and o's for him to prepare for, Stoops called on Leach to join him at Oklahoma. In 1998, the year before Stoops arrived in Norman, Okla., the Sooners had the worst scoring offense in the Big 12 Conference and ranked 101st in the nation in that category. With Stoops arriving and hiring Leach as offensive coordinator, things turned around quickly on that side of the ball, bringing in Heisman Trophy runner-up Josh Heupel at quarterback and running back Quentin Griffith, who would finish second to Billy Sims for career yardage by an OU runner.

Over this past weekend, ABC/ESPN analyst Brent Musberger, responding to rumors that Leach's next head coaching stop could be the University of Washington, expressed concern that the Red Raider ruler had a "backyard of talent" in West Texas and would have to compete with University of Southern California Head Coach Pete Carroll for recruits on the West Coast. Other journalists point out that recruiting is a challenge for Leach anyway, having to compete for Texas talent with Texas, Texas A&M and Oklahoma. But Heupel and Griffith were both recruits who were overlooked by most Divison 1-A schools. Where he cannot recruit, he can scout.

The Sooners set six Big 12 Conference records and 17 school records and were one of only two schools in the nation to have six players with 20 or more receptions in 1999. Leach left after that season, but left his mark as the Sooners, two years removed from a string of three straight losing seasons, finished the 2000 season 13-0 with a BCS national championship. Heupel finished second in the Heisman Trophy ballot and Griffith eventually finished his career second to 1978 Heisman winner Billy Sims in career rushing yards at OU.

After one year at Oklahoma, he was hired to replace the retiring Spike Dykes as head coach at Texas Tech. He had endeared himself to the community not only by consistent success in football, a creative rendition of the spread offense that makes for an entertaining as well as successful product, but also his diverse interests and unique personality. His fascination with pirates, which is reflected in his office décor, also inspired him to provide eye patches for 4,000 students to don during Saturday's game.

When the hype of having the No. 1 team in the nation visit Lubbock prompted students to "camp out" for tickets, Leach held a barbecue for those students.

How do you keep such success in perspective? Ask the New York Times reporter who saw the coach reciting passages from "The Wicked Wit of Winston Churchill" in a narrow hallway under the stadium after the victory over the Longhorns. With diversions comes perspective.

Leach went from a law school graduate with no coaching experience to a Division 1-A head coach in a BCS conference in a matter of 14 years. Now the nation is taking notice of a man who is mastering the game, but knows there is more to life.