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Pirate Notebook No. 18
Wednesday, October 17, 2001

By Denny O'Brien
Staff Writer and Columnist

In Huntington, West Virginia, Marshall athletics director Lance West waited by the phone. And waited. And waited.

Down in Orlando, Central Florida's director of athletics, Steve Sloan, did the same.

But neither received that much-anticipated call from Conference USA commissioner Michael Slive.

Instead of extending a football-only invitation to one of the schools to join Division I-A's top non-BCS league, league presidents decided they aren't ready to pull the trigger.

"Expansion remains an agenda item for the conference," Slive said in a press release on Monday. "There are several matters that need to be addressed in the coming months. The Board discussed expansion at length, but decided that it was not ready to proceed at the present time."

Conference expansion became inevitable last winter when Slive inked a deal with ESPN to televise the league's football and basketball games.

The TV deal has its share of quirks, including a couple of games to be shown on Tuesday nights, making C-USA college football's television guinea pig — Southern Miss and Louisville, last night, were the first lab rats to be subjected to the experiment.

But the idea of a conference football championship game that would be televised nationally on ABC had too much appeal to pass up, thus C-USA gladly began to set up shop in its new TV home.

However, for C-USA to make its way onto Disney's flagship network for a high-profile championship extravaganza, NCAA rules state that it must add another member, bringing football membership to 12. South Florida, which joins in 2003, makes number 11.

For whatever reason, be it money or timing, school presidents delayed a decision. The reality of a 12-team, two-division league may now come later, rather than sooner.

Folks in the ECU camp know just what Marshall and Central Florida are going through. The Pirates' C-USA inclusion was often discussed, often tabled, until finally the belated invitation came.

For Marshall, the no-news means it will continue to compete as a member of the MAC, a conference which, with the addition of the GMAC bowl tie-in, now has two holiday options for its members.

Down the line, when C-USA finally gets around to making its precise intentions known, the Herd may opt to stay in the underrated MAC anyway, if for nothing else, out of spite — not to mention the reality that the school has no other conference to turn to for its other sports.

In the Wake of C-USA's decision to not make a decision, according to the Orlando Sentinel, independent Central Florida will also find refuge in the MAC. It's a move reportedly predicated upon the school making a five-year commitment to the MAC as an act of good faith.

As a result, C-USA's options for a respectable Member No. 12 in the near-to-intermediate future appear, on the surface, to have narrowed dramatically.

Barring the breakup or realignment of one or more of the BCS conferences, the schools which are thought to have expressed interest and which are likely to get serious consideration from Conference USA's big wigs are Southern Methodist and Tulsa.

On the other hand, perhaps Slive and the league's Board of Directors have some emerging information to which the rest of us are not privy.

Could it be that the final piece to the puzzle is the one the conference's presidents have apparently been targeting all along, an independent institution hallowed with tradition, one which has consistently spurned past overtures — the alma mater of Roger Staubach and Joe Bellino?

It turns out that the Midshipmen welcomed aboard a new athletic department staff member little more than two weeks ago, one with deep C-USA roots. Chet Gladchuk, who had served as director of athletics at league member Houston since 1997, assumed command of the Navy program on October 1.

When Tommy West took the step up from defensive coordinator to head coach at Memphis, he brought with him a few changes.

Gone are those familiar silver britches that the Tigers have worn for years. They have been replaced by those new-age, stripe-intensive, Denver Bronco-like unis that seem to have invaded college football programs all over the country.

Gone is the assumption among the Tiger contingent that Memphis is and should be a lower-division C-USA team, which was common during the Rip Scherer era.

Gone is that boring style of smash-mouth offense, which often consumed large chunks of time, but rarely produced an adequate amount of points.

Just like the their new fashion statement, the Tigers have adopted college football's latest offensive fad. It's that which has ECU head coach Steve Logan most concerned as Saturday approaches.

"Over the last three or four years, they've been a constrictive-type of set, where they run the ball and control the clock and those types of things," Logan said. "They've turned the corner and are very well-orchestrated on offense.

"They're gonna spread you out and throw the little quick screens, a lot of misdirection in the backfield. They've done a really nice job of it and are scoring points at a rapid rate. It's going to be a test, as usual."

While the Tigers have recently found fame with their offense, they certainly haven't haven't lost there identity on defense. The Pirates can expect another hard-hitting, quick-to-the-ball bunch there.

"The Memphis team that we're getting ready to encounter is typical in that they are very competitive on defense and have got a good kicking game," Logan said.

"Their defensive backs are what stand out. I haven't seen everybody in the conference, but from what I've seen so far, these defensive backs are the best that I've seen. They really are physical, they break up passes, they intercept balls, and they will come up and tattoo you on the run. Their defensive unit at Memphis is still, in my opinion, one of the top three in the conference."

That is certain to present a challenge to ECU's receiving corps, which has struggled at times this season. And with a Memphis offense which poses a serious threat, each Pirate possession becomes increasingly important.

"We used to go into a Memphis game and say, well if we can find a way to get 17 or 21 points, we're going to be in good shape," Logan said. "That's not the case now — we're going to have to score.

"They've scored on just about everybody they've played. We've got to make sure and show up on offense and we've got to make sure our defense at least makes them snap the ball and see if we can't get a turnover or make them make mistakes."

If so, the Pirates' chances of pulling off a Homecoming victory greatly increase.

"I think the next five weeks of football games for us, it'll be a 50-50 deal going into every game," Logan added. "This is going to be another one of them. If we play well and they play well, it'll come down to the fourth quarter, I suspect."

Piece by piece, bit by by, defensive coordinator Tim Rose is patching together East Carolina's defense.

Wake Forest exposed a glaring weakness in week one, pounding the Pirates' defensive front all night long to the tune of 294 yards rushing. That has since been corrected.

"We struggled early with several issues and we've been solving them one at a time," Logan said. "We're stopping the run nicely now.

"We have not given up long pass plays as a rule, though there's been one or two. The next piece of the puzzle is for us to be a little more efficient in the intermediate passing game. If we can get that done, I think we can step forward."

The intermediate passing game has been an Achilles heel for the Pirates since the victory over I-AA William and Mary. The Tribe, Orangemen, Heels, and Black Knights all exploited ECU's zone coverage, which has given opposing receivers plenty of room to operate.

The Pirates have been especially vulnerable when opposing quarterbacks leave the pocket. Run-pass threats have often left Pirate DBs playing the guessing game. And more often then not, the Pirates have guessed wrong.

"Maybe that'll happen this week," he said. "It'll be tested this week because these guys run a lot of mis-directions, a lot of what we call 'nakeds' where you fake one way and the quarterback comes out unprotected, throwing crossing routes.

"We've got to do a better job of getting underneath those routes than we did the last two weeks."

Arnie Powell can now add another position to his football resume. Against Army, the Deep Creek, VA, native saw extensive action at tight end.

Powell came to ECU with excellent quarterbacking credentials. But with the presence of David Garrard, Logan thought he could best utilize Powell's talents at split end. At 6-foot-five, 214-pounds, Powell certainly fit the mold of his Pirate predecessors — Larry Shannon and Troy Smith.

Last year, Powell was moved to flanker, where it was thought his size would come as an advantage on both deep routes and intermediate routes over the middle. Yet, Powell had trouble with the intermediate ones, struggling to haul in those David Garrard darts.

Lack of production at the tight end position this season prompted Powell's latest move, which resulted in two catches for 46 yards, including a 37 yard touchdown against the Black Knights. Most importantly, he didn't have a drop.

It certainly was heartwarming to see Powell, who has been inconsistent for much of his career, play such a vital role in the Pirates' victory on Saturday. After four years and four positions, maybe Arnie has finally found his role.