THE RENO REPORT – Good Luck, Chuck!
Printer-friendly versionAn Iowa native & SDSU Alum on the Firing of Chuck Long By Jamie Reno Exclusive for East County Magazine November 25, 2008 (San Diego) — The announcement this week that San Diego State University head football coach Chuck Long was fired stirred up wildly mixed emotions in me. On the one hand, as a rabid San Diego State football fan who attended SDSU in the 1980s and is sick and tired of losing seasons, I was ecstatic. Get rid of the guy! On the other hand, as someone who has idolized Long for the last 25 years, I was crushed. How could they fire my hero? Yes, I am admittedly conflicted. When you’re born and raised in Iowa, as I was, studying Chuck Long’s storied biography is an unavoidable rite of passage and rooting for him is an inextricable part of your DNA. While at the University of Iowa from 1981 to 1986 (he redshirted his freshman year), Long had an epic run. One of the greatest Big Ten quarterbacks of all time, he led the Hawkeyes to four straight bowl games including the Rose Bowl in 1995 under legendary coach Hayden Fry. Long, whose impossibly accurate passes, innate leadership and calm demeanor let everyone on the field and in the bleachers know just who was in control, was edged out by Bo Jackson that year in the closest Heisman Trophy voting ever (Long should have won). That season, in the most memorable game in Iowa football history, #1 Iowa faced #2 Michigan at Iowa’s Kinnick Stadium. With Iowa trailing 10-9 and time running out, Long led the Hawkeyes on a methodical 66-yard drive against the nation’s top ranked defense, twice converting third-and-eight situations into first downs. Long drove the Iowa team to the 12- yard line with two seconds remaining to set up kicker Rob Houghtlin’s game-winning field goal as time expired. His numbers for the day against the best defense in the land? 26 of 39 passes for 297 yards. Take that, Wolverines! A member of the college football Hall of Fame, Long was just as well known for his classy demeanor off the field as for his athletic prowess on it. A genuinely good guy, good student and good citizen, the humble but ever-confident Long’s legend in Iowa has only grown these past two decades since he graduated – yes, with a diploma – in 1986. I’ve followed his career closely ever since. Long was a disappointment as a quarterback in the National Football League, but that was largely because he was drafted by a horrible football team. A classic old-school pocket passer who was about as mobile as the Chargers’ Phillip Rivers–maybe even less so –Long played for the Detroit Lions when that terminally sorry team had one of the worst offensive lines in modern football history. Long didn’t have much of a chance to shine in Detroit, and although he later played for the Los Angeles Rams, he never made much of an impact in the pros. But that didn’t tarnish his legend one bit among Iowans, who care little what a player does after college as long as he contributes while in Iowa City. Long, whose pro career ended in 1991, eventually moved on to college coaching. Returning to his alma mater in 1995, he served as Iowa’s defensive backs coach. Long had no coaching experience but very quickly became a respected defensive coach. In his three seasons coaching the DB’s (1995-’97), Iowa led the nation in interceptions returned for touchdowns in 1995, and led the Big Ten in interceptions in 1997. After the 1998 season, Iowa coach Hayden Fry retired, and Long was considered for the job, but Iowa instead went with Kirk Ferentz, who remains at Iowa City today. Long left Iowa City to become the quarterbacks coach at Oklahoma, whose head coach Bob Stoops and Long were teammates on Iowa’s 1982 Rose Bowl team. Long was a coach on the Oklahoma team that won the 2000 national championship and coached quarterback Josh Heupel to a second place finish in the Heisman Trophy balloting that year. After the 2001 season, Long was named offensive coordinator. Oklahoma won the Rose Bowl following the 2002 season, and in 2003, the Sooners set a Big 12 Conference record by averaging 51.5 points per game. In 2004, Long was named as a finalist for the Broyles Award as the nation’s top assistant coach. He was an assistant coach at Oklahoma for six seasons, including four as an offensive coordinator, and Oklahoma compiled a 67-11 record during his time there. When San Diego State fired coach Tom Craft three years ago, all kinds of A-list names were buzzing around Montezuma Mesa as his possible successor. When Long was picked, some people were a bit surprised. Long appeared more than ready to take on the duties of a head coach, and I was excited about SDSU’s football future for the first time in a long time. Long had no head coaching experience, but he had paid his dues as a valuable assistant at two esteemed Division One programs. He was a winner, and I just knew he would turn this program around with his football knowledge, quiet confidence and indefatigable optimism. But Long showed up at State with a bit of overconfidence. Perhaps he didn’t really know what he was getting into, but upon his arrival he inexplicably told the media–me included–that he could win right away and that he didn’t think it would even be necessary to wait until he got all his own recruits into place before the team started producing on the field. That proved to be a gargantuan mistake in that expectations were raised. And certainly it didn’t help his case when Long proceeded over these last three years to win just two road games and go 9-27. It’s been ugly and painful to watch. I went to San Diego State. I lived in La Mesa and rode my bike to school