Graham is coaching dichotomy
Associated Press
PITTSBURGH
First-year Pittsburgh coach Todd Graham wants people to know he’s as much old-school as he is innovative.
While at Tulsa the past four years, Graham’s offenses were regularly some of the most potent in the nation. But he stresses physicality as much as he does the spread-the-field approach that is his reputation.
He’s worked to modernize the program, too. Televisions at the team’s practice facility have been upgraded — flatscreens only — and he’s made sure coaches are seen with Ipads when they go into homes on recruiting visits.
And once those kids get to Pitt, ear rings, bandanas and “filthy” language? Not allowed.
Laid-back enough to allow former players into the postgame locker room, but enough of a disciplinarian to insist on tucked-in shirts and 6 a.m. “tour of duty” team workouts, Graham is out to play both sides of the coaching fence as he attempts to lead the Panthers back to being Big East conference champions and beyond.
“Someone said to me the other day, ’Hey coach, you gonna win the Big East?’ I said, ’I’m gonna bet my job on it,”’ Graham relayed Tuesday while speaking to a small group of reporters.
“I’m going to get hired and fired based on winning football games.
“But I’m going to do it my way, period. I don’t believe the most talented, best team always wins. More times than not, they don’t — it’s the best football team that plays together, the team that loves each other and the team with standards.”
Graham was hired five weeks ago as the ultimate replacement for Dave Wannstedt, but only after a disastrous two-week tenure for Mike Haywood, who spoke more of discipline than he did of winning at his introductory press conference in December, only to be fired New Year’s Day following his arrest on a domestic violence charge.
Graham’s only reference to the Haywood situation came when he said, “The timing of all this, a lot of people look at things differently than I did, but I think when you’re facing great adversity, I thought it made it a better job, made it a better situation for me and for what we’re about.”
Direct references to Haywood might or might not be taboo, but Graham is making other players’ transgressions front and center among his team. Articles of college football players from across the country who ran into trouble with the law, or some other disciplinary issue, are continuously printed out and hung in the weight room.