The Man With The Plan wasn’t going to cut and run. There he was, standing right up there on the lectern with a big bull’s-eye on his back as America’s Most Wanted in the land of college football. And he didn’t even flinch.
Lesser men would have quivered or whined about being ranked No. 1 in all the pre-season polls.
You know the coachspeak bit: “We haven’t even played a game yet ‘…”Those polls don’t mean a thing” … “We pay no attention to preseason rankings” … Yada, yada, yada.
None of that gibberish came from of the mouth of the defending national championship coach, who has ushered his football to the precipice of greatness, where no team has ever gone. And still wants some more.
Nope. On Media Day he owned it.
Go ahead, give Urban that No. 1 albatross.
Maybe it will be a head start on his third BCS title in four years. After all, he knows what it’s like to begin the race at the back of the pack.
How about 114th out of 116? That’s where he was ranked in his first year as a head coach. His Bowling Green Falcons were so far back they were hoping for a caution flag to catch up. The Falcons had already been lapped before they came out of the box.
“The first year (2001) I pulled out one of those preseason magazines,” Meyer said of his first media day as a head coach. “I think they were ranking them through 116. I looked at the pages and figured we’d be around 90th or something like that. I get through 90, nope. Through a hundred, nope. At 114 I flipped the page and there were the old Bowling Green Falcons right there — 114th in the country in preseason!”
At MAC Media Day in Detroit, he pulled up a chair in virtually anonymity and played to an empty room.
“I’d walk in, sit down for a while and I figured ‘I’ll be able to go back to my room,’” he recalled.
“Do I miss those days? Sometimes I do.”
Sometimes it’s great now, sometimes not. Increasingly Urban seems to be getting a bit annoyed at the media crush and having to devote so much time to it. Remember, the Florida Gators have become a national team and the big boys seem to think they are always entitled, even if the local media often has to scrap for tidbits now that practices have been closed. And they may be scrapping even harder if some of the new SEC guidelines for media aren’t revised.
This being Florida Media Day, however, Urban did his solid 20 minutes and headed over to do the TV stuff. And he was on his best behavior.
I loved the way he didn’t duck the anointment.
“I’m very humbled where we’re at,” he said, but he did admit that the déjà vu made him realize how things have changed.
“Asking that question, my mind is spinning and I’m getting a visualization now of walking in to the Detroit Renaissance Center,” he said. “And that’s a whole different world than this one.”
But, then, the Florida Gators are also in a whole different world than they used to be, too.
What most of us are waiting to see is how the master strategist will play this hand. He’s already getting coached up by some of his mentors and friends.
One tip Lou Holtz gave him was to find all the dictionaries and white out the word “repeat.”
Well, not really, but Holtz said that “repeat” should not be part of his or the team’s vocabulary.
No mention of “national championship” or even “SEC Championship.” Just “getting to Atlanta” will suffice, please.
Nor should the world “undefeated” be used when applied as a team goal.
From there it’s all about maximum commitment, sacrifice and team unity.
When it comes to the perfect model, Urban likes to point to the American military. But he is careful not to equate playing football with digging foxholes under live fire.
“I am a big fan of our military but I have to be very careful about equating what we do with them,” said Meyer. “The ultimate motivation and the ultimate unselfishness is our men and women who are overseas. So why not learn from that? I’m not saying compare what we do to them. Because we play games at stadiums.”
As always Meyer will bring in motivational speakers, starting with Holtz who spoke to the team this week. He also plans a bit of a military theme and has invited Danny McKnight, commanding officer for the Army and a hero of the “Blackhawk Down” incident in Somalia, which inspired a book and movie.
So what’s ahead for Meyer & Company?
I see a talented, focused team with strong leadership that is equal to the task getting to Atlanta, likely getting to Pasadena and having a crack at another national championship (yes, I can say it).
As for the No. 1 ranking, it is a tremendous honor that must be earned, just like each starting job must be earned every week. And so does Urban. But it’s nice to be honored as such.
“You hear some people say they don’t want to every be ranked No. 1,” he said. “ [I think it’s] great. I’ll take it right now every year for the next 10 years. Mean we have great team and great players.”
Even though they have come from the back of the pack for all three of their national championships I like the Gators’ chances when they are up front. Now they must keep the pole/poll position.
“If we follow the Plan, we all stick together and steal some of these great motivational techniques — unselfish approach, teamwork … I think we’ll be fine.”
The last hurdle to be overcome may be numerology. National championships have come after the 1996, 2006 and 2008 seasons. Can the Florida Gators win in an odd year? Yeah, because nothing they do anymore seems odd.