It's a good thing Terry Holland's loafers would dwarf my size-ten feet.
There's a pair of soles on which I wouldn't care to walk from now until
December.
During that period, the East Carolina athletics director will face what
is the most difficult and important decision administrators must make the
employment status of a head coach of a revenue sport.
That's the setting in which Holland now resides with regards to Pirates
football coach John Thompson.
Chances are he'll get advice from every Joe Donor from here to Timbuktu.
Better him than me.
About the only certainty now is Thompson's questionable status as ECU's
coach. Given several opportunities to extend a vote of confidence, Coach
Holland has carefully avoided such statements by indicating the program is
under review and that no decision would be levied until the season is
concluded.
In the end, the primary question Holland must answer centers around his
confidence in Thompson's ability to do the heavy lifting to restore East
Carolina to its once-proud stature and position the program for inclusion
with the "haves" in the next round of Bowl Championship Series-inspired
conference reconfigurations.
So far, most of the evidence isn't in Thompson's favor.
"A lot of times when you come into a new job, the program is really
down," Thompson said in May 2003 after having gone through spring drills
observing the talent at his disposal. "They're used to losing. We're not
used to losing here. We expect to win. We get better here and make some
improvements, we're going to be winning championships. That's our goal.
"It's not like we've got to get better to be competitive. We get better,
then we're going to be up there fighting for championships."
Given that analysis, one might lean towards one of two theories either
Thompson made a poor initial assessment of the program, or he has struggled
with player development and preparation. That several of the players he
inherited now reside on NFL rosters makes the latter argument the safer bet.
The overall lack of improvement especially on defense is one of many
factors Holland no doubt will take under heavy consideration. Preparation,
attention to detail, and the ability to adjust on the fly also are areas of
high importance which are unlikely to get high marks when the report card is
tabulated.
Take the two season openers in Thompson's brief tenure, embarrassing road
losses from which ECU never fully recovered. In both cases, the Pirates
appeared completely unprepared defensively despite full knowledge of the
opposition's designs on offense.
Cincinnati's and West Virginia's commitment to the run was no magic rabbit.
Yet, the Bearcats rushed for 361 in the 2003 opener, while Mountaineers
bruiser Kay-Jay Harris alone tallied 337 to inaugurate the 2004 campaign.
The mistakes that underscored those outings persisted last week against
Houston and again Saturday night versus South Florida. To date, poor
tackling and blown coverage have been the common denominators on defense
during Thompson's reign.
"We're all very frustrated," Thompson said following the Pirates' loss at
USF. "You bust your heart trying to do it and keep doing it and it doesn't
happen and that's the way it is sometimes. But the only way we're ever going
to fail is if we quit."
No question, the Pirates by and large have shown the type of fight that
would defy their 3-18 run over the past two seasons.
Still, there are legitimate questions about whether ECU can afford to
wait another season to see if the urgently needed turnaround materializes.
On more than one occasion, J.T. has added to those questions by
contributing to the odds confronting the Pirates. Several of his gameday decisions have been low percentage and had
direct negative effects on the outcomes of games.
There was the decision to kick a field goal down 14 against Wake Forest
with less than ten minutes to play. The botched fake punt early at Southern
Miss from deep within ECU territory allowed the partisans at The Rock to
relax and enjoy the trappings of Homecoming.
Saturday it was the call to accept a holding penalty instead of forcing a
USF punt, granting the Bulls an opportunity to extend the drive a second
chance on which they capitalized with a long pass and eventual score.
"We could have taken the fourth down," Thompson said of the USF decision.
"We just tried to get some field position out of it and back them way up
because it was a long one. It was going to be fourth-and-four there at
midfield or it was going to be third-and-24 back where the penalty was. We
took it and it backfired on us."
Now the question is whether or not it will backfire on J.T.
Though the benefit of the doubt typically goes to the coach after only
two seasons, it's unlikely that Thompson would be retained because of
unwritten protocol. If he returns, rest assured it's because Holland is not
only fully confident in his ability as a head coach, but also that it will
make the most economic sense.
After all, that is the bottom line in college sports. If football is the
engine behind a successful Division I-A program, the almighty dollar is the
fuel.
I guess that means Joe Donor runs the filling station.
Chances are, Holland is trying to gauge how much gas is in the program's
tank.