Family Values

Having Grown Up in the Stoops\' Household, Family Values Are Applied to Life Both On and Off the Field
by: Jeff Davis
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“My door is open. 24-7,” says the University of Arizona’s new 42-year old football coach Mike Stoops. It’s the first policy Stoops instituted when he became the 28th coach in the 104 year history of football on the Tucson campus last November 29th.

Stoops’ declaration signaled the start of give-and-take between players and coaches, a family-like feeling at a place crying for it. It’s a rare concept in the big business-like atmosphere that is intercollegiate athletics. At Arizona, it signaled a sea of change from Stoops’ predecessor, John Mackovic.

Stoops adheres to principles he learned as a child in Youngstown, Ohio where he grew up in a football family with future coaching brothers Ron Jr., Bob, and Mark under the watchful eyes of their coaching father Ron Stoops Sr.

The senior Stoops put together legendary attacking defenses over a 28-year career at Cardinal Mooney High School in one of America’s premier football hotbeds, Northeastern Ohio. Mr. Stoops, who died in 1987, is a personal hero to all his sons. His eldest son, Ron, now holds his father’s former job, defensive coordinator at Mooney. The others headed westward into college coaching after playing and remain exceptionally close.

“He always brought us along wherever he went. We watched and we learned,” Mike says. “We will have family nights during the season. Bob does it. We believe in it.”

“He has young kids. His staff is young. He welcomes their families and wants them to attend practice. They came to spring practice,” says Arizona Daily Star sportswriter Charles Durrenberger. Durrenberger has covered the Wildcats through the coaching regimes in Tucson of methodically successful Dick Tomey and Mackovic’s unfortunate ending. “That’s the way he is. It will be fun, particularly if they win.”

Most important, Coach Stoops does not play lip service to his door policy. “My door is closed only if I am in a meeting where confidences must be maintained. Otherwise, a player can come to me anytime,” he says. “That includes when I am looking at tape, going over the game plan, or writing a letter. The players come first.”

It’s not a one-sided deal either. Like any successful coach, Mike Stoops asks for and gets results in return. As Assistant Head Coach and Defensive Coordinator at Oklahoma from 1999 through last season under his brother Bob, Mike’s attacking units consistently placed in the top ten nationally. The adage that defense wins champions held true in 2000 when the Sooners went 13-0 as they held Florida State to a safety in the Orange Bowl to win the National Championship. In the 2003 regular season before he accepted the Arizona job, the Sooners led the nation in total defense, pass efficiency defense, and pass defense, were third in scoring defense, and tenth in rushing defense.

“Mike sat under his brother and saw how Bob does things,” says George Schroeder, who covers Sooner football for the Daily Oklahoman. Schroeder is one of many observers who thought the younger Stoops brother might have been ready to move on a year or so earlier. “He had plenty of time to see how Bob does things as head coach. Bob gave him a model, a blueprint.”

When Arizona Athletics Director Jim Livengood went looking for a new coach last season to replace Mackovic who he fired in mid-season, he zeroed in on Stoops. OU’s well regarded basketball coach Kelvin Sampson, a Livengood friend from their time together at Washington State had recommended Mike two years before. This time he pounced and quickly gained the approval of the school’s president Peter Likins. “We made the right choice,” a confident Livengood said at Stoops’ introduction. At Arizona, finding the right man has been the near-impossible task since the sport began in 1901 where 27 men before Mike Stoops have held the job.

Statehood was another eleven years away when the University of Arizona started playing football. Through the first half century or so, the biggest name there by far was regional legend, tailback Art Luppino, the “Cactus Comet.” Luppino led the nation in ground gaining and scoring in 1954 and again in 1955.

That singular moment in the desert sun was far from enough to establish Arizona football. Moreover, that was compounded by the undeniable fact that from 1958 through ‘79, the Wildcats were also-rans in the state to Arizona State and its controversial big winner Frank Kush. While Kush won 76 percent of his games running up 76 victories, Arizona kept running through coaches. This time, they hope they have the winner they have sought. .

“I knew Lute Olson from Iowa when I was a football player there and he was basketball coach,” Stoops says. Basketball was a loser when Olson took over at Arizona in 1984. He made it a perennial national power, winning a national championship in 1997 and always in the hunt for more. Stoops saw similarities in the football situation he could not pass up.

“Mike thought Arizona was not necessarily a sleeping giant, but had the resources where he could win and win quickly,” says George Schroeder.

“Lute tells Arizona fans to ‘get your tickets now because you won’t be able to get them when they start winning,’” Durrenberger notes. Winning, of course, starts with players, not slogans, and Mike Stoops is on the move.

“Their talent level is way down, probably 9th in the Pac 10,” Durrenberger notes. Stoops knows he doesn’t have the home grown talent in Arizona to compete with a USC or other Pac-10 powers. Naturally, he will go after players in neighboring talent rich Southern California. Everybody else does. The key though, will be Texas. With a late start, Stoops landed four of the top 100 from the Lone Star state. “He had experience recruiting Texas when he was at OU,” says Durrenberger.

Arizona, notes Schroeder, “is really not that far from West Texas. I would think they consider Texas a neighboring state, kind of like California. That’s where they will find their deepest talent pools.”

That’s where coaching philosophy comes into play. “We will attack on defense,” the coach asserts. There can be little doubt of that. His defensive coordinator and trusted assistant happens to be the fourth coaching Stoops brother, Mark who left Miami to join Mike. Stoops won’t live or die on defense either. Like OU under Bob, “We will install a spread offense. We will put our systems together and we plan to win some football games,” the coach says.

A spring addition to the Mike Stoops staff as tight ends coach is Steve Spurrier Jr., who worked last year in Washington with the Redskins under his dad. Steve Spurrier Sr.’s defensive coordinator in the 1996 national title run was Bob Stoops. Another case of all in the family, the extended family.

Speaking of family, Arizona is negotiating future dates with Mike Stoops’ alma mater, Iowa. Could Oklahoma and a meeting with brother Bob be forthcoming?

“No way!” he says emphatically. “Not a chance!” Not in that family.

Mike Stoops Advice to Aspiring College Coaches “I get asked the question a lot, ‘how do you get into college coaching?’ It’s a tough answer. The best way I believe, comes as a Graduate Assistant. Playing in college helps you get to the college coaching level. That’s the way I started and just stayed at the school I graduated from (Iowa) and became a graduate assistant. I must warn any aspiring coach that it’s almost as hard to get a GA position as a full time one. “You step up the ladder. The more people you know in the business helps get you there and, of course, help you move up. The NCAA cut GA positions a few years ago and only two are allowed per school these days. You still need to get a break. And you make your break by knowing a coach personally who would be willing to give you a break and put you in that position as a graduate assistant. “Just because you can’t get a graduate assistantship, does not mean you should give it up. “Sometimes you have to take a step backwards to go forward. A lot of high school coaches who have enjoyed some success want to get into college. To do so, they usually have to take the same route: take a GA position, then go on. Some aren’t willing to be demoted to promote themselves. It takes a very strong person to do that. But that is the best way. “There’s so many different scenarios. There will be some tough times which you will have to work your way through and stay on course. A lot of people don’t have that perseverance. You have to do a lot of the grunt work. There’s not a lot of glamour when you start out. If you do your job right, it will pay off in time. It takes a unique person to focus in on it. I advise anyone who wants to get into coaching to take the job seriously and it will pay off. “You might not think people notice, but they do. The people that matter do notice and will give you your break.”

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