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Pirate Notebook No. 37
Monday, December 24, 2001

By Denny O'Brien
Staff Writer and Columnist

Marshall's Bob Pruett doesn't exactly fit the mold of the new-breed college football coach. Judging by appearances alone, the Herd's six-year head coach looks more at home woofing down an early bird special at the K & W than roaming the sidelines of a championship caliber football program.

Thin-haired, slightly overweight, and quick-witted, Pruett is rarely mentioned in the same breath with latter-day baby boomers Bob Stoops (Oklahoma), Mike Leach (Texas Tech), and Mark Richt (Georgia), all of whom are considered among coaching's fastest rising stars.

That's not to say that Pruett isn't deserving of such recognition. In six seasons in Huntington, Pruett has established one of the most successful programs in college football, regardless of division. In his first, the Herd won all 15 of its contests, including the I-AA national title.

The Herd then made the jump to I-A, as a member of the Mid-American Conference, where it won four-consecutive league titles, a string that fell just short of five with a loss at Toledo last month.

Bowl games have become an annual rite of passage for Marshall, which has scored invitations in each of its seasons as a I-A program. Only once under Pruett's tenure has the Herd faltered in a post-season game, bowing 34-31 to Ole Miss in the '97 Motor City Bowl.

Ask Pruett about his formula for success and you won't get algorithms or theorems, and you won't get a formula about 50-50 run-pass percentages.

You're unlikely to hear prophetic statements about how important it is to stay short-sighted. And it is highly doubtful that he'll point to the importance he places on winning on the game's final play.

Instead, you'll get a bold, brash statement about the long-range goals for which his teams play each year.

"We play for championships," said Pruett in a confident, gruff voice. "This is the 17th we've played for since I've been here, either divisional, or conference, or bowl, and we've won 15 of them.

"We play for championships. That's our standard, that's our goal, and that's what we play for. Anything else is unacceptable."

So, trailing by 30 with as many minutes to play, it should have come as no surprise that quarterback Byron Leftwich would herd Marshall past a band of shipwrecked Pirates.

With an East Carolina team, which had established a track record of fumbling those seemingly insurmountable leads, lined up in the crosshairs of a fiery-eyed coach that would accept nothing less than victory, comeback was almost inevitable.

"We believed it could happen if we would just go out and make plays," Pruett said. "We believe at Marshall."

It's that type of mentality, that 'We've got something to prove.' swagger that used to exist at East Carolina. Embracing the role of red-headed step-child, the Pirates rarely opened the door for opportunity once they had an opponent on the ropes.

On Wednesday night, quarterback David Garrard didn't smell blood when the Pirates took the field to begin the second-half. It took just one pass and 30 seconds for ECU's all-time leading passer to smell a comeback.

"You could definitely sense it," said Garrard, a senior from Durham. "I don't know what it is. With 38 points on somebody in the first half, you should be able to hold that."

Risky play-calling on offense opened the floodgates to the Herd's second-half stampede. Instead of focusing on its north-south running game with a mixture of timely, deep play-action passes, East Carolina went cute with the option, as well as those sometimes dangerous passes in the flat.

Defensively, the Pirates were equally accommodating to a second-half barrage. Rushing three and dropping eight, the ECU defense gave Marshall's ace marksman plenty of time to work, and Herd receivers found the eight-man zone easy to slice.

Injured and exhausted, Leftwich often found success hitting his fourth and fifth option, while dropping his name in next year's Heisman hat.

But perhaps even more glaring was East Carolina's lack of an emotional field general � a gritty, gutsy throwback to whom all teammates look in times of adversity.

Past Pirate teams fed off such leaders. David and Darren Hart were the namesakes of their senior class, leading the most successful three-year stretch during the Steve Logan era and butting a few heads along the way.

Jeff Kerr wore the purple heart for the '99 outfit, a unit that won nine times and finished the regular season among the nation's top 20. Any visible evidence that he passed the torch didn't exist, however, even though seniors Garrard and Pernell Griffin were anointed the lead dogs.

Though Logan has often said his prized seniors were confrontational in the locker room, neither Garrard nor Griffin are outwardly emotional by nature.

Mild-mannered and friendly, both Garrard and Griffin are better examples of good home rearing as opposed to being nasty, in-your-face, gridiron grizzlies that strut, spit, and swagger.

It was enough to give any head coach a handful of fresh new grays. Perhaps, even enough to fester an ulcer.

"I've been through hell and back this year," Logan said after his team blew its 30-point lead Wednesday night. "This particular team was on a mission to kill me and they almost did. I think every one of our games went down to the last play of the game."

More often than not, the Pirates found themselves on the short end of that stick.

Probation aside, that's what they play for at Marshall. It even says so on page two of the media guide.

Fourth-quarter performances weren't a propelling force for the Pirates this year.

East Carolina used to make it a point to dominate the fourth quarter. But for the better part of the 2001 season, most opponents owned the Pirates during the game's final period.

The game-ending lapses took their toll on senior defensive tackle Bernard Williams, who was obviously frustrated about the manner in which the Pirates fell to the Herd last Wednesday.

"Ever since I've been at East Carolina, we've talked about winning the fourth quarter," Williams said. "I can't recall a time this year that we've won the fourth quarter.

"I told the guys in the locker room at the half that the game was going to be won in the fourth quarter. If you look at that game, it was won in the fourth quarter."

It was just one of eight games that would come down to the fourth quarter. Unfortunately for the Pirates, they would win just two of those nip-and-tuck battles.