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Frantastic

Dennis Franchione creates winning teams wherever he goes.
by: Jane Musgrave
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When Texas Christian University stomped Arkansas State in its third game this year, it was more than just another win in a season that is supposed to put the once hapless team on the map.

The 52-3 drubbing stretched the Horned Frogs' winning streak to eight - their longest since 1938 and the fourth longest in the country.

TCU Coach Dennis Franchione shrugs amicably when asked about the historic victory.

"The only stat I worry about is the 'W,'" he says.

Franchione's nonchalance about setting, breaking or even shattering school records is understandable. For the 49-year-old coach, record-breaking victories have become almost routine.

In 1998, his first at TCU, he led the Horned Frogs to their first bowl victory in 41 years with a surprise 29-18 win over Southern Cal in the Sun Bowl.

The year before, he took New Mexico to its first bowl game in 36 years. The Lobos participation in the Insight.com Bowl was the culmination of back-to-back winning seasons, something that hadn't happened in Albuquerque since 1971.

Before that, there was the turnaround at Southwest Texas State. The team that hadn't had a winning season in five years, was in the winning column both years Franchione was at the helm.

And anyone who has even taken a passing interest in college football knows about his years at Pittsburg State University in Kansas. He took a team that had recorded only 10 winning seasons in 20 years and set the stage for it to become the winningest ball club in the nation. (By 1994, it had posted an 110-13-0 record — tops in the nation.) When he left Pitt State in 1985, after five years as head coach, he had posted a 53-6 record, leading the team to five straight conference championships, five consecutive playoff appearances and a regular-season winning streak of 45 games.

Is it any surprise Franchione is getting a reputation for having a Midas touch?

"I've jokingly said I've never gotten a good job," Franchione says when asked about his magical ability to turn the most lackluster program into gold. But those who have watched Franchione say there's no hocus-pocus involved in his winning formula.

"There's no magic to it," says Pitt State head coach Chuck Broyles, who worked as an assistant under Franchione and has known him since high school. "Dennis is driven. He works hard - extremely hard."

"He has all these sayings, and one of them is, 'The only thing that's equal between you and your opponent is that you both have 24 hours in the day and the way to beat them is to outwork them.' And, that's what he does. He outworks them."

Emporia State head coach Jerry Kill, who played for Franchione at Southwest Texas and worked under him at Pitt State, agrees.

"He'll work your ass off," he says. "I don't know anyone in the country who is going to outwork the guy."

For starters, those who have worked under him say, Franchione is a master of organization. Nothing is left to chance.

When players arrive for summer camp, he hands each of them a 200-page binder that outlines everything they could possibly need to know - from the practice schedule to the team roster to a definition of what it means to be redshirted, even the school fight song.

"I am detailed-oriented," Franchione admits. "During the summer I plan every practice from the first day of camp to the first game."

Just as players get the 200-page Players Policy Manual, his assistants get notebooks detailing the time, date, location and drills for each and every practice.

Franchione says his obsession with planning is an outgrowth of his belief that people function best when they know what to expect.

"If I'm organized, they can work efficiently," he says of his assistants. "I give them direction and then I allow them to do their jobs."

Predictability is even more important to players, he says. "I believe players do their best when they're comfortable in their environment - when they have a routine and know what to expect. If they are confused or become disrupted, they can't focus on what's important."

And obviously, that's winning games.

The organization also allows Franchione to make full use of every minute of practice.

"There's no walking around time," Kill says of Franchione's carefully orchestrated practices. "Coach Franchione believes you learn by repetition and that's what you do during practices. There's no wasted time."

The repetition assures there are no surprises on game day, says Anton Stewart, an assistant at Pitt State who, like Kill, played and coached for Franchione.

"When you went out to play, you were very well prepared," he says of his experience playing for Franchione at Southwest.

In fact, Kill says, after Franchione's rigorous practices, games were easy "You'd seen it 100 times in practice so everything was automatic."

What's not so automatic is the way Franchione deals with players when he takes over a program.

When he comes in, he institutes a clean-slate rule. When he arrived at Texas Christian two years ago, for instance, he told players he wasn't going to look at any of the game films from their abysmal 1-10 season under coach Pat Sullivan.

"We came in and judged them from the day we got there," he says. "All of them got to have a fresh start. I judged each of them on their work ethic and their accountability. We didn't bring up the past."

In addition to freeing them from their past, Franchione was able to look at them in new ways. What he saw surprised some players.

The year before Franchione got to TCU, Patrick Batteaux was a wide receiver. Not just a wide receiver, but the leading ball carrier for the team. Still, when Franchione looked at Batteaux he didn't see a receiver. He saw a quarterback.

He moved Batteaux from the go-to guy to the guy who decided who to go to. Batteaux led the team to a 7-5 regular season record and its first bowl victory since the Frogs beat Syracuse 28-27 in the 1957 Cotton Bowl. But Batteaux wasn't the only player who found his - and the team's fortunes - in new positions.

Franchione turned linebackers and tackles into tight ends and got more production out of receivers who had done little under Sullivan. To some, moving a top receiver to quarterback might seem risky. Franchione laughs at the suggestion.

"When you inherit a 1 and 10 team there's not a lot of risk in anything," he says, with typical self-deprecating humor.

Over the years, he says, he's learned that players are often miscast. When he arrived at Pitt State, for instance, there was a player who was riding the bench. The player had a reputation for being untrustworthy and rarely saw any action.

Franchione says he watched the kid and decided he'd been miscast. He turned him into a defensive end, and by his senior year the player was an All-American.

"We had a fresh outlook," he says. "Also, some players rise to new levels when a new coach comes in."

But, he says, while he doesn't hesitate to shake up a roster, he never does it unilaterally. "I didn't make any player move without talking to him and letting him try it," he says. Further, the player is allowed to voice his concerns.

That kind of dialogue is important, he says. Players need to feel that they are part of the decision-making process.

"I tell players to come in and say what you need to say. If you're down in the locker room complaining, that doesn't do any good. Come on up and talk to me," he says of his open-door policy.

It doesn't mean he will bow to their demands. But, he says, he will listen. "I'm the leader. I'm the boss. But I'm approachable," he says of the message he communicates to his players - one that he says helps win their confidence and inspires them to perform.

"Trust is the No. 1 word in our program," he says. If he disagrees with a player, he'll tell him. "I'll say, 'You're not going to like this, but this is the way I feel.' Anybody that know me knows that what you see is what you get. There's no ego. If I don't like something, you can tell. I'll tell players exactly what I think."

He is equally willing to adjust his game plan to the skills of his players. Over the years, particularly during his first two years at TCU, he has developed a reputation for having a penchant for rushing over passing. The style seems to conflict with the current trend in college football to throw the ball and throw it long.

But, Franchione says, he isn't wedded to a rushing game anymore than a player should be wedded to a particular position.

In Batteaux, for example, he had a quarterback who could think quickly and run the ball well. A long ball thrower, he wasn't.

That's why in 1998, the Horned Frogs compiled the eighth largest rushing total in the nation, rushing for a total of 2,630 yards, an average of 239 yards a game. Last year, the numbers were nearly identical as the team rushed for 2,640 yards, an average of 240 a game.

This year, however, in Casey Printers the Frogs have a quarterback who can throw the ball. Against Arkansas State, for example, the team rushed for 200 yards and passed for 204. That's what Franchione says he is looking for - a balanced offense.

And, with LaDainian Tomlinson, the nation's leading rusher and a Heisman Trophy hopeful, Franchione clearly isn't going to abandon the running game.

Truth of the matter is, with or without Tomlinson, it's not in Franchione's nature.

He readily admits he is a disciple of the running game and is less than enamored with the spread the field offense used at Kentucky, Oklahoma, Florida and Brigham Young, to name a few. A team that can run the ball will always beat those who "throw the ball all over the field," or, as he calls it, "the air ball thing."

His view of rushing vs. passing is simple: "The team that runs the ball best and stops the ball best will be successful."

And Franchione obviously knows about success.

He is one of the winningest active coaches in Division I, both in his percentage of victories and the sheer number he has racked up during his 17 years as a head coach. His name is right up there with such legends as Joe Paterno, Lou Holtz, Steve Spurrier and Bobby Bowden.

Still all of them have one thing that Franchione lacks: a national championship. And he makes no secret that the thought of a national championship burns brightly in his thoughts.

But while his name has come up when powerhouses such as the University of Oklahoma and Louisiana State have been looking for coaches, he says he's not looking to leave TCU anytime soon.

"What's wrong with TCU becoming another Virginia Tech?" he asks.

It's not as if it hasn't before. In 1938, TCU won a national championship. It was same year the team posted an eight-game winning streak - the streak the Horned Frogs tied in September when it beat Arkansas State. And, Franchione insists, he is happy coaching at TCU. Of course, that was the same thing he said when he was at New Mexico, before Texas Christian came knocking with an estimated $700,000- to $800,000-a-year offer that made him the highest paid coach in the Dallas area, ahead of Cowboys head coach Dave Campo.

"I always thought this school was a diamond in the rough," he says. "I'm here at a good time right now."

A time when records are being broken.

But wait, this is Franchione. The man who breaks records wherever he goes.
Franchione's tenure at Pitt State is legend
Winningest Active Division I Coaches
(Ranked by victories)

Rank / Coach, School / Victories

1. Joe Paterno, Penn State- 317

2. Bobby Bowden, Florida State- 304

3. LaVell Edwards, BYU- 251

4. Lou Holtz, South Carolina- 216

5. Dan Nehlen, West Virginia- 195

6. John Cooper, Ohio State- 184

7. George Welsh, Virginia- 183

8. Jackie Sherrill, Mississippi- 164

9. Dick tomey, Arizona- 153

10. Ken Hatfield, Rice- 144

11. Larry Smith, Missouri- 140

12. Frank Beamer, Virginia Tech- 130

13. Dennis Franchione, TCU- 128

14. Fisher DeBerry, Air Force- 126

15. Steve Spurrier, Florida- 122

By the Numbers
(As of Oct. 20)

Pittsburg (Kan.) State College 1985-89 53-6-0

Southwst Texas State 1990-91






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