Report: Prince headed to KSU
By Jay Jenkins / Daily Progress staff writer
December 3, 2005

Al Groh has been beating the pavement and logging frequent-flyer miles this week in hopes of finalizing a stellar recruiting class for 2006.
Such is life as a Division I football coach, but it has also kept Virginia's coach from keeping close tabs on the situation surrounding Ron Prince, his offensive coordinator, who has been interviewed twice this week by officials from Kansas State University.

Several University of Virginia officials said on Friday that they had heard that Prince had been offered the vacant head coaching position at KSU and it was just a matter of time before it became official.

Also, gopowercats.com and rivals.com released a story Friday night that said that Prince would be introduced on Monday as Kansas State's next coach, replacing longtime coach Bill Snyder, who retired last month after 17 seasons. It was reported that Prince would receive an annual salary of $750,000, a sum that was agreed upon on Friday.

That was news to Groh, but he did get a progress report on how Prince's interviews went.

"I know that things went very positively for him out there," Groh said in reference to Prince, who has been at UVa for five seasons and had his second interview in Topeka, Kan., on Thursday.

Virginia's other coordinator, Al Golden, has also been listed as a leading candidate for the vacancy at Temple. Golden has been UVa's defensive coordinator for the past five years.

Prince, 36, grew up in Junction City, Kan., which is just miles from KSU, and was an offensive lineman for two years (1988-89) at Dodge City Community College (Kan.), before playing his final two seasons at Appalachian State in Boone, N.C.

After a one-year stint as a volunteer assistant at Dodge City in 1992, Prince spent the next eight years working at Cornell, James Madison, South Carolina State and Alabama A&M before being hired by Groh to be on his first staff at Virginia.

Prince has shown "great growth," during his five years at Virginia, Groh said Friday night.

"He came in here with his first [offensive] line coaching job at a program at this level and did an excellent job with that," Groh said. "He quickly moved up to the responsibility of being the offensive coordinator. He did an excellent job, especially from a leadership standpoint, there. So, whenever the opportunity comes for him, he has certainly shown, he has a history now of being able to grow into the jobs of a higher level that he has moved into.

"And we would expect that when he has the opportunity to do that as a head coach, that he will be able to do the same thing."

Losing Prince would be the second assistant in a week that Groh lost from his staff. Associate head coach and outside linebacker's coach Danny Rocco was named the head coach at Liberty University on Friday.

"Just the same thing as with Danny, [Ron] has been a tremendous positive for us here and if it does work out that both of them are able to get head coaching jobs in the same week, it is very affirming, in both in terms of their ability and that there is in an interest around the country to have coaches who are going there and to kind of do things the same way that they have been done here," Groh said. "Obviously, a few people think it is being done the right way."

It has been reported that Prince flew from Charlottesville on Thursday in a Cessna Citation jet that was bearing a Kansas State logo on the tail and stamped with "K-State" on either side of the aircraft. Prince, reportedly, flew back to Charlottesville later Thursday afternoon.

Kansas State Athletic Director Tim Weiser declined to comment on the search in an e-mail to The Daily Progress on Friday.

Reporters asked Weiser on Friday night at a Kansas State women's basketball game about the search, but he stuck to his guns.

"If we have anything to report we will," Weiser said. "It's business as usual."

Prince's agent Barry Terranova told the Kansas City Star on Thursday that his client was looking at the Kansas State job as one that will be quite lengthy.

"For him, this is a terminal job, one he'll want to be at forever," Terranova said. "He truly feels that way. This is not a guy who wants to use this to get somewhere else. This is where he wants to be. This is the goal."

During his tenure at Kansas State, Snyder went 136-68-1 and won six National Coach of the Year honors.

The tides have changed in Manhattan, Kan., the past two years as the Wildcats went 4-7 and 5-6, respectively. KSU went 2-6 in the Big 12 Conference's North division and were the only team in that division to fail to qualify for a bowl game.

 

It's official: Rocco hired at Liberty
By Jay Jenkins / Daily Progress staff writer
December 3, 2005

Friday evening, hours after a press conference and numerous other interviews, Danny Rocco did what he does best.
He grabbed the remote, started up the VCR and watched a movie. It was not a rental, but rather the kind that football coaches watch in the winter game tape.

So, what's the main difference for the 45 year old? It was Liberty University game tape.

Earlier on Friday, Rev. Jerry Falwell, Liberty University's chancellor and president, announced Rocco's hiring at a press conference, making the former UVa associate head coach the seventh coach to lead the Flames football program.

"Danny Rocco is a perfect fit for Liberty University in every way. Liberty is fortunate to have him," Falwell said in a released statement. "Coach Rocco is one of more than 20 NCAA Division I football coaches who expressed an interest in this position, which is a tremendous endorsement of the potential for Liberty's football program.

"I firmly believe Coach Rocco can lead Liberty in reaching its goal of becoming a dominant Division I-AA program and then moving up to Division I-A, all within the next decade."

Rocco replaces former coach Ken Karchner, who was fired last month after the Flames lost their final 10 games to finish the season 1-10. Rocco becomes the seventh coach in LU's history, something that he was ecstatic about Friday evening.

"It was a long one, but it was a really good day," Rocco said. "They received us so well. Everybody was just awesome. It has been a great day for me, and a great day for my family really."

It was a rewarding day for Virginia coach Al Groh as well, who has known Rocco since he transferred from Penn State to Wake Forest in 1981 to play football for Groh. Prior to joining Groh's original staff at UVa in 2001, Rocco spent one season under Groh with the New York Jets, working as a defensive assistant.

"It is a great thing for Danny," Groh said. "I can remember the first day that Danny first came to us as a transfer student when we were coaching at Wake Forest. We have been together quite a long time and I have seen him develop from being a player, to being a captain of the team, to being a coach and now being a head coach.

"It is a very gratifying thing to see and we are very happy for him."

Rocco stressed on Friday, like he had done on Thursday, that the position at Liberty was a "perfect fit" for him and his family and that leaving Groh and UVa was a tough decision.

"[UVa] was one of the best stops that we ever had," Rocco said. [My wife] Joy and I have had the opportunity to be in some really good programs across the country. One of the things that was unique about UVa was the quality of life in that town is just outstanding. Everybody is such a strong supporter of the university."

Rocco said he would always cherish how the Virginia fan base became more intense from year to year as Groh built a program that qualified for four straight bowl games.

"I really, really enjoyed the way the fans started to rally around the things that Al was selling," Rocco added. "The atmosphere at a UVa football game was different year two, three, four and five than it was in year one. That's really exciting and they really bought into it and we were putting a pretty solid product out there on the field and I think there's still a lot of enthusiasm for the future."

Despite his departure and the possibility that offensive coordinator Ron Prince (Kansas States) and defensive coordinator Al Golden (Temple) have been linked to other head coaching vacancies, Rocco is confident that Groh will have no trouble in filling the position(s).

"We are all replaceable," Rocco said. "I love the energy that a lot of fans put into these different chat-lines and Web sites and it is great, it is a great outlet for everybody, but I learned a long time ago ? as a young coach I have gone in and replaced veteran coaches with great reputations and I have been on the flip side of that thing. There are a lot of good coaches out there. There are a lot of good coaches that are out of work right now and transitioning jobs.

"What Al Groh will do, he will make the best decisions to fit what he needs now. It is a different circumstance. It is a different job than it was five years ago. He had all the right fits, I thought, when he was putting his original staff together and it held together real well. We got a lot of mileage and we had a lot of successful recruiting classes and now it is just a matter of re-evaluating what his needs are. Whatever those needs are, he will make those decisions."

Inheriting a program that has won only 21 games in past six years will be a challenge for Rocco, but Groh said he was confident that the experience that his understudy got at Virginia would help in the turnaround.

"It is a rare circumstance where a fella gets to take over a team at the height of its success," Groh pointed out. "Usually, there is some retooling to be done, but he is certainly aware of that. He has been through that process with us here. He was an integral part in creating the energy that has been necessary to bring the type of players here that have upgraded the program. So, he has already had experience in this type of situation."

Rocco, who signed a five-year contract with Liberty that starts on Jan. 1, 2006, said he would not be at Virginia's practice session today, he will remain at Liberty, but he would return when bowl preparations started on Dec. 19. UVa is awaiting word on which bowl game they will play in, although it appears likely that they will play Utah on Dec. 29 in the Emerald Bowl in San Francisco.

Rocco has two children - David (14) and Amy (11). Rocco said Amy was "anxious" about the job.

What about David?

"I will say this, David has text [messaged] me a couple of times today and he got online and saw some things that were really positive," Rocco said. "I think he is kind of flattered by it.

"He'd never say it, but he is proud of his old man."

And so is Al Groh.

 

Minter's injury remains bothersome for Cavaliers
By Whitelaw Reid / Daily Progress staff writer
December 3, 2005

There has been speculation within the last few weeks that Donte Minter's knee injury may be more serious than originally thought.
The 6-foot-8, 250-pound junior underwent arthroscopic surgery over the summer and has been rehabilitating ever since. Minter, a Fork Union Military Academy alum, has missed the first four games of the season.

During his teleconference on Friday, UVa coach Dave Leitao confirmed that Minter's return is more uncertain than ever.

"He was getting better," Leitao said, "but he had a little bit of a setback and has been a little slowed in the last few days."

Leitao, whose squad could certainly use a low-post option in its ACC opener Sunday night at Georgia Tech, said there is a "two-pronged issue" with Minter's injury.

"The knee needs to be healthy enough that he can be relatively pain free and play through practices and ultimately get into a game," Leitao said, "[and] there's his basketball shape that gets affected by [not practicing]."

Leitao also revealed that freshman big man Laurynas Mikalauskas didn't start against Northwestern because of a minor hip injury that he sustained in practice a couple days before the game.

The injury, coupled with Leitao wanting to go with a smaller lineup against the Wildcats' motion offense, was the reason the Blue Ridge product only played eight minutes.

"It was really sore the day before the game and a little better game day," Leitao said. "We got into the second half, and it started tightening up. It didn't make any sense for him to go out there and maybe take another hit. We were up by enough in the second half that when I wanted to go back to him, I didn't feel it was quite necessary."

Sophomore Adrian Joseph started in Mikalauskas' place and scored 10 points.

Leitao sounded like he was leaning toward putting Mikalauskas back in the starting lineup against the Yellow Jackets. "Quite possibly," he said.

Meanwhile, Leitao said junior point guard T.J. Bannister (sports hernia) is one to two weeks away from a return. That's been the party line for the last month. However, this time it sounds more promising.

"I think somewhere in the next day or two he'll start participating in practice and we can slowly get him more comfortable with the pace that we're practicing at and get him familiar with what we're doing on the floor," Leitao said. "Once we do that, if he can participate without any pain, we'll be more confident that he's ready to play."

 

Seminoles a bunch of no-names outside Florida
Only three signees for Cavaliers, Leitao says
By Doug Doughty
THE ROANOKE TIMES

If Florida State feels slighted going into Saturday’s ACC Championship game, who can blame the Seminoles?

When the All-ACC football team was announced this week, Florida State (7-4 overall, 5-3 ACC) did not have a single first-team selection.

Even Duke, which went winless in ACC play and finished 1-10, had one first-team All-ACC selection, John Talley, a defensive back on a team that gave up 342 points in eight conference teams.

I’ll admit that I voted for Talley, but I also voted for Seminoles’ defensive lineman Brodrick Bunkley, who led the ACC in tackles for loss with 20 ½.

Bunkley, injured defensive linemate Kamerion Wimbley, who is out for Saturday’s game; and freshman wide receiver Greg Carr were the only second-team All-ACC selections from Florida State.

In 2004, the Seminoles had three first-team selections and five second-team selections off a team that went 6-2 in the ACC (9-3 overall) and finished second behind Virginia Tech. But, even in the best of times, Florida State’s all-conference representation has not measured up to its record.

Fact is, the farther away from the ACC’s voting hub that schools are, the more poorly they fare in the All-ACC balloting. Miami had three first-team picks this year and Boston College, one of only three ACC teams with eight wins or more, had one.

N.C. State (6-5) had three first-team players on defense alone.

John Justus, who administers the voting through the Atlantic Coast Sports Media Association, said there was a significant dropoff in the voting this year and he’s at a loss to explain why.

As opposed to the 100 ACSMA members who voted for the All-ACC team last year, only 72 voted this year, including all four registered Roanoke Times voters (Randy King, Aaron McFarling, Mark Berman and yours truly).

When Virginia Tech quarterback Bryan Randall was named ACC player of the year in 2004, he received 75 votes – 62 more than runner-up Brock Berlin. This year’s winner, Wake Forest running back Chris Barclay, had 17. Tech quarterback Marcus Vick had 16, followed by Maryland linebacker D’Qwell Jackson with 15.

Justus speculates that a voting deadline that coincided with Thanksgiving may have contributed to the dropoff in the voting, but nearly 80 percent of the ballots were submitted after last Saturday’s games, so, those ACSMA members who voted showed due diligence.

WHEN ADVISED FRIDAY that Virginia offensive coordinator Ron Prince either had taken the Kansas State head-coaching job or was on the brink of leaving UVa, Hargrave Military Academy coach Robert Prunty observed, "So, I guess he’ll be taking Anthony Poindexter with him."

With Danny Rocco already introduced as the new head coach at Division I-AA Liberty and Prince and defensive coordinator Al Golden seen as the favorites for vacancies at K.-State and Temple, the Cavaliers are in position to lose not only the top three assistants on their staff but there could be more fallout.

UVa linebackers coach and recruiting coordinator Mark D’Onofrio almost certainly would join best friend Golden at Temple, but I’m having a hard time seeing Poindexter leaving his alma mater and his native central Virginia and moving to Kansas.

If Golden leaves, obviously there would be considerable in the coordinator’s job, but I wonder if consideration would be given to moving Poindexter to the secondary, where he had an All-America career as a Cavaliers’ safety. Golden took over the defensive backs this year after coaching the inside linebackers for four previous years.

As speculated in yesterday’s UVa Insider, former Cavaliers’ aide Mike London is in his first year as an assistant for the Houston Texans, who are 1-10. The Texans showed improvement in each of their first three seasons under Dom Capers, but Capers is now 17-42 in his fourth season.

A sizable pay increase was too much for London to turn down and there’s no assurance that he would return to the Cavaliers, even for a coordinator’s position. But if Golden leaves UVa and the Texans were to make a head-coaching change, London’s name would get a lot of circulation.

The Texans favor the 3-4 defense that Virginia played during London’s four years as an assistant in Charlottesville and he was a fixture in the Peninsula area that Rocco has recruited since last winter.

SPECULATION CONCERNING UVa’s staff could not have come at a worse time as the Cavaliers were preparing to entertain as many as 10 uncommitted prospects on official visits this weekend.

In-state visitors include defensive end John Graves from Meadowbrook High School in Richmond, defensive back Greg Davis from the Blue Ridge School, wide receiver Jacoby Ford from Fork Union and "sleeper" John Bivens, a 6-2, 230-pound safety from Prince William outside Petersburg.

Prince’s departure could have an impact on Lumberton, N.C., offensive lineman Hutch Eckerson, who already has visited Virginia and has listed UVa as his favorite – or a slight favorite – for most of the fall.

However, Prince would have been his position coach and Eckerson told rivals.com that coaching stability is a major consideration and he is not sure the Cavaliers would remain his leader if Prince left.

More unusual than the exodus at Virginia, where nobody can be faulted for pursuing a Division I-A job, is the immunity of Virginia Tech’s coaching staff to turnover. Head coach Frank Beamer, while not standing in the way of his coaches’ professional advancement, has been exceedingly fortunate in keeping his staff together while continuing to string together seasons with 10 or more wins.

REPORTERS ARE STILL waiting for a news release on Virginia’s men’s basketball signing class, but, more than two weeks after the end of the letter-of-intent period, coach Dave Leitao did provide some information in a teleconference Friday.

Leitao said the Cavaliers signed three players: 6-8 Johnnie Lett from Mobile, Ala.; 6-9 Jamil Tucker from Gary, Ind., and 6-6 Will Harris from Queens, N.Y. He also said that UVa had received commitments and, when pressed, confirmed that it was commitments – plural – and not a single commitment.

The first commitment was from Solomon Tat, a 6-5 Nigerian by way of Stockbridge, Ga. Presumably, the second is from 6-7 Andy Ogide from another Atlanta suburb, Dallas, Ga. It has been reported by recruiting columnists for rivals.com and thesabre.com that Ogide signed a letter with the Cavaliers, but that’s not what Leitao said.

UVa currently has nine scholarship players, all of them underclassmen, and would have only four available scholarships unless somebody left. But, as long as it has taken oft-injured post man Donte Minter to make his 2005-2006 debut, one can only wonder if he will remain at UVa for the long haul.

 

Virginia Tech Could Become New ACC Bully
By MARK LONG : AP Sports Writer
Dec 2, 2005 : 6:04 pm ET

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Florida State coach Bobby Bowden picked up the phone Monday and called, of all people, Virginia Tech coach Frank Beamer.

Bowden wanted advice.

Nothing could have said more about the revamped Atlantic Coast Conference: No longer are the Seminoles the team to beat, the bully of the block.

Florida State won the league title 11 times in 12 years after joining the ACC in 1992. But that quickly changed when Virginia Tech and Miami came aboard last season.

The Hokies won the conference title last season and have a chance to repeat Saturday night in the inaugural ACC championship game at Alltel Stadium.

Most believe No. 5 Virginia Tech (10-1, 7-1) already has replaced the Seminoles (7-4, 5-3) atop the conference. But players and coaches from both teams agree the Hokies have to prove it on the field when they meet for the first time since the 2002 Gator Bowl.

"Florida State has national championships, Heisman Trophy winners, league championships. They have done so many great things," Tech defensive end Darryl Tapp said. "We've only had one ACC championship. We're by far nowhere near them, but we're taking some right steps."

The Hokies can make huge strides Saturday by winning the game, earning a Bowl Championship Series berth and probably playing in the Orange Bowl.

The Seminoles have other plans, despite enduring their first three-game losing streak since 1983 and being outscored 89-36 against Clemson, North Carolina State and Florida.

"We're looking forward to it," defensive end Kamerion Wimbley said. "Everybody's eager. We like the opportunity to prove we're still a quality team. We don't want to be written off. This is our chance."

Given the Seminoles' struggles, Virginia Tech is a double-digit favorite in the game. But the Hokies are taking more of an underdog approach, harping on Florida State's longtime league dominance.

"I don't feel like we are a favorite," said Beamer, whose team backed into the ACC title game when Georgia Tech upset Miami two weeks ago. "When you look at it, I know where they are, but when you talk about Florida State and their program and you name the top 10 teams in the country, you put them in there. I'm not sure you put Virginia Tech in there year after year."

Maybe not.

Virginia Tech doesn't have a national title and played for it all just once -- losing 46-29 to Florida State in the 2000 Sugar Bowl.

The Hokies also haven't beaten the Seminoles in 11 meetings since Bowden took over in 1976, and Beamer is 0-6 against Florida State.

"You wish that meant something," Bowden said. "But this is Virginia Tech of 2005, and we're Florida State of 2005. You look at the records and you wonder why we're here. I cannot see them wilting to what happened 30 years ago. I can't see that. We'll simply have to play our best football game and they'll have to make some mistakes. Mistakes can neutralize a lot of things."

The Seminoles haven't lost four in row since 1975, the year before Bowden took over. Bowden blames the losing streak on inconsistency and inexperience. Those problems have been highlighted by numerous injuries, most notably along the offensive line.

Even though the excuses may be justified, the Seminoles still have received plenty of criticism -- most of it directed toward offensive coordinator Jeff Bowden.

Bobby Bowden defends his son and vows the offense will be more productive with some patience, especially considering the team has a freshman (Drew Weatherford) starting at quarterback.

But all the complaints, the calls for him to fire his son and the constant clamoring for change, might be getting to the 76-year-old coach.

"The thing that I resent a lot is that you have a year that's not real good and people all of a sudden start saying, 'Oh, the program is destroyed. Oh, the program is gone. Oh, the program is playing like it was 50 years ago,'" Bowden said. "Where's the competitiveness? We can come back as easy as anybody else. It's this far from the White House to the outhouse, and it's this far from the outhouse back to the White House. And I've been on both ends in my 53 years of coaching.

"As long as I stay here, I will fight to get back. When I can't fight anymore, I'm gone."

Maybe the frustration prompted Bowden to pick up the phone and call Beamer. He asked Beamer what he did to turn things around at Virginia Tech following the 2003 season, when the Hokies lost five of their final seven games, including three in a row.

"My first response was why is he calling me after all of these games he has won?" Beamer said. "In the end, I was really honored that he would feel like we would have something to talk about or maybe share."