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Tomey leaves Arizona with pride
Updated: Friday December 08, 2000 9:55 AM
Dick Tomey quit at Arizona when he saw his players defending him before jeering fans at the Wildcats' final game. This week, on the morning after an emotional team awards dinner, Tomey told me he is holding his head high. Under his leadership, Arizona finished second in the Pac-10 in wins during the 1990s. Tomey coached an Outland Trophy winner in Rob Waldrop and a Thorpe Award winner in Darryl Lewis. He has left his successor, John Mackovic, with a young, talented team. Tomey says he wants to remain in coaching. He also says he is convinced that the days of a coach staying at one school for 14 seasons, as he did at Arizona, are over. The pressures are too great, the hurdles too high. Tomey knows a lot about coaching. I hope he's wrong about this.
Presidential DawghouseThe reformers in college athletics want the presidents to be in charge. Georgia has discovered there are two sides to presidential control. University president Dr. Michael Adams overruled athletic director Vince Dooley 's recommendation and fired Jim Donnan.Adams noted that Donnan's record against the Dawgs' biggest rivals wasn't very good -- it wasn't -- and cited Donnan's leadership off the field as deficient. So get this: Donnan's record was 39-19. Dooley, who knows a thing or two about coaching, wanted to keep him. The fans, according to an Atlanta newspaper poll, wanted to keep him. And by firing Donnan when he did, Adams put Dooley in a bind. The best candidates to coach the Dawgs have either taken other jobs or gotten contract extensions to stay where they are. Either Adams isn't telling us something or he needs to exercise some presidential self-control.
Who dat?In this week of awards -- and aren't there a lot of them? -- I've got one that nobody has thought to present: The Out of Nowhere Award.A year ago, no one outside of Blacksburg and perhaps his immediate kin knew who Lee Suggs was. A year ago, he was the freshman backup to Virginia Tech tailback Shyrone Stith. When Stith bolted the Hokies for the NFL, Suggs got his chance Then, when quarterback Michael Vick got hurt, Suggs became Tech's biggest offensive weapon. Suggs led the nation in scoring with 28 touchdowns, which is also a Big East record. He also set three other league records and led the conference in rushing as well. Like Vick himself, he's only a sophomore. The two of them will make some kind of dangerous tandem a year from now. Sports Illustrated senior writer Ivan Maisel covers the college football beat for the magazine and is a regular contributor to CNNSI.com.
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