PITTSBURGH Cowher regains control of the Steelers
When President Dan Rooney got rid of Tom Donahoe, the team returned to prominence.
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Three years ago this weekend, the Pittsburgh Steelers were locked in a chaotic power struggle that threatened to tear apart one of the NFL's most successful organizations.
Coach Bill Cowher's team had just collapsed for the second straight season, going 6-10 with seven losses in the final eight games. Following three trips to the AFC championship game from 1994-97, the Steelers were 13-19 over the next two seasons.
Cowher, no longer the edgy but always-in-control leader, seemed distracted and confused. Maybe it was because he and director of football operations Tom Donahoe had long since stopped talking, or that some players had grown weary of his jaw-jutting blowups and in-your-face histrionics.
Or maybe it was the persistent rumor, repeated on every Pittsburgh street corner for weeks, that his marriage was in trouble -- one he finally felt compelled to deny during his weekly news conference.
For most NFL owners, who work in an environment where change not only is a constant but a necessity, the decision would have been obvious: the coach must go.
Donahoe resigned
Not in Pittsburgh, where the Steelers change stadiums more often than they do coaches. After a week of public debate over who should go, the Steelers announced Cowher would return but that director of football operations Tom Donahoe, given equal credit with Cowher for the Steelers' resurgence in the early 1990s, was resigning.
Now, as the Steelers (10-5-1) head into today's wild-card playoff game against the rival Cleveland Browns (9-7) off their second consecutive double-digit win season, team president Dan Rooney is more confident than ever that he made the right call.
Since the Steelers retained Cowher, they have gone 32-15-1, made the playoffs twice and won two more division titles.
"Stability, I think, is the key," Rooney said, reflecting three years later on perhaps the biggest crisis of his nearly 50 years with the organization. "You have to give a coach or anyone in a position like that a chance to do his job. You can't make a quick judgment or yank them out of the job, because it doesn't really help you. It just puts you back. What we had built with Chuck Noll and Bill Cowher, they were able to come on and do the job."
In most NFL cities, it's considered much easier to change the coach than the players when times get tough. In Pittsburgh, they change the players.
Only eight players remain
The Steelers will take the field today with only eight of 23 starters, counting the kicker and punter, remaining from 1999. Many who departed had begun tuning out Cowher in 1999.
"Some of those guys really didn't want to do it coach Cowher's way, and I think that's why they're not here any more," safety Lee Flowers said.
With seven division titles, Cowher has won more than any coach except for Don Shula (11), Noll (9), Bud Grant (9), Tom Landry (9) and Chuck Knox (7). Of that group, three (Shula, Noll and Knox) coached more than 20 years, and only Grant (15) coached fewer than 19 seasons. Cowher has coached 11 seasons.
The Steelers' 109-66-1 regular-season record under Cowher is the AFC's best and ranks behind only the 49ers (117-59) and Packers (116-60) in the NFL. Among active head coaches, only Dan Reeves and Marty Schottenheimer have more victories.