What must really burn Memphis State fans' britches must be that USF didn't campaign for the admission for the Big East....they came to us. Tom Jurich was instrumental in this process, much to he chagrin of people like 'L-yes'.
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When the fall of 2003 rolled around for USF to begin C- USA play, a seismic shifting of the conferences was occurring. Suddenly, USF was a possible target of the Big East.
``USF hit all of the hot buttons, the pressure points of what their criteria was [for a future member],'' said Kevin O'Malley, a sports media consultant for the Big East.
While Memphis, East Carolina, UCF and Marshall bombarded the Big East with telephone calls and letters, USF decided to take a completely different approach.
[b]The Bulls waited for the Big East to contact them.
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Evolution Of A Program
By BRETT McMURPHY
bmcmurphy@tampatrib.com
Jul 1, 2005
TAMPA - Ten years ago, the University of South Florida's athletic department faced the very real possibility of being stuck in the Southern Conference with the likes of Elon and Wofford.
Ten years later - and light years away from Elon and Wofford - the Bulls have been accepted into a neighborhood that is strictly upscale.
Today the Bulls join the Big East, one of the nation's top six Division I-A conferences. Now part of the Bowl Championship Series, USF theoretically can win a national championship in football. USF's other 15 basketball-playing partners each has reached the Final Four.
To reach this once-unthinkable point, there were plenty of twists and turns, some impressive networking and some old- fashioned luck.
Offer They Couldn't Refuse
Four years after joining the Metro Conference in 1991, USF was ready for a bigger conference.
There was just one small problem: The new league being formed was not interested in USF.
The yet-to-be named league was taking Louisville, Tulane and Southern Miss from the Metro, leaving USF, UNC- Charlotte, Virginia Tech and Virginia Commonwealth behind.
Having already been rejected three times by what will become Conference USA, USF athletic director Paul Griffin commissioned a study of USF's other options. They weren't pretty: Return to the Sun Belt, join the Southern Conference or become an independent in Division I-A or I- AA.
``We had alternative plans,'' Griffin said. ``But they all smelled like bad fish.''
Ultimately, the Bulls came out smelling like a rose.
Metro bylaws required teams leaving the league to forfeit their NCAA Tournaments ``units,'' meaning Louisville, Tulane and Southern Miss would lose more than $2 million. However, Metro bylaws could be changed by a two-thirds majority vote. So USF and UNC-Charlotte made the three exiting teams an offer they couldn't refuse.
USF and UNC-Charlotte officials said they would vote for departing members to keep their NCAA ``units'' under one condition: They had to take USF and UNC-Charlotte with them into C-USA.
So on April 24, 1995, C-USA announced its 11-member league, including USF and UNC-Charlotte.
Less than five months later, the Board of Regents approved the start of USF football.
Griffin now had to hire a football coach to build the program from scratch. From dozens of applications, five finalists emerged: Nebraska assistant Tony Samuel, Bradenton Manatee High coach Joe Kinnan, former Minnesota Vikings offensive coordinator Jack Burns, Boston University coach Dan Allen and a 38- year-old Kansas State defensive coordinator named Jim Leavitt.
Less than a year after Leavitt was hired, he was attending a party at a prominent Davis Islands residence. The guest list was a who's-who of area celebrities and sports figures.
Then-USF president Betty Castor was chatting with Leavitt and a couple of other guests about the upcoming football season.
``Coach Leavitt was talking with Coach [Steve] Spurrier and Coach [Bobby] Bowden, how they would be in the top 10 or 15,'' Castor said. ``And [Leavitt] mentions he just ordered helmets.''
Now, less than 10 years later, Leavitt's program is on equal footing with Spurrier and Bowden on the college football landscape. USF belongs to a BCS conference.
``We're now in the same room with everyone else,'' Leavitt said. ``Before, we were outside that room. It's huge for recruiting to be able to play for a national championship.
``Nobody dreamed 10 years ago we could go from [Division] I-AA to playing in a conference with an opportunity for a national title. It's unbelievable.''
And without its unbelievable success under Leavitt, USF never would have been in this position.
``I talked to a wide range of people,'' Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese said. ``People from all backgrounds who knew a lot more about football than I did, and they all kept saying the same thing: USF has enormous potential.''
Griffin, now a senior associate AD at Georgia Tech, believes USF's success already is being taken for granted.
``People have a naive impression that any football program in Florida will be successful,'' Griffin said. ``If it was easy for USF to have a good football program, why hasn't it happened in other programs? There's been far too little credit given to [Leavitt to] put together a competitive team at the I-AA level and advance that, given the limitations to compete at a I-A level.''
``Football,'' former USF athletic director Lee Roy Selmon said, ``was a very important part of the puzzle.''
Subtle Approach
A vote was to be conducted on C-USA's football expansion on Oct. 11, 1999 - nearly a month after Castor's final day as USF president.
Yet Castor, no longer on USF's payroll, paid her own way to New York to represent USF.
``I thought it was important because it was a presidents meeting,'' said Castor, now founder of Campaign for Florida's Future, a political action committee, and still a USF season-ticket holder. ``It was something I wanted to do.''
Griffin said Castor's commitment was incredible.
``There were some dicey moments there, and South Florida could have easily been left out if Betty wasn't there,'' Griffin said. ``That's what stands out about her commitment and legacy.''
With Castor present, USF was granted football membership. Despite ``guarantees'' to Castor and Griffin from C-USA commissioner Mike Slive and the league's presidents that the Bulls would join by 2001, USF was forced to wait until 2003. UAB president Ann Reynolds insisted on a two- year delay, the same wait UAB incurred.
Without a conference for two years, the Bulls took out their frustrations on the field. In 2001, USF pulled off college football's biggest upset. The 22-point underdog Bulls upset Pittsburgh 35-26 and finished 8-3.
Three months later, USF's men's basketball team also won at Pittsburgh. Shortly afterward, Pittsburgh-area high school students began receiving ice-scrapers for their cars, courtesy of USF's admissions office.
An attached letter tells prospective students: ``Leave this with your parents because you won't need it at the University of South Florida.''
USF's success kept snowballing in 2002. Leavitt's Bulls finished 23rd in the final BCS standings. But without a conference affiliation, USF became the first non-probation Top 25 BCS team not to receive a bowl bid.
Included in USF's school-record 9-2 season was a 4-0 mark against teams from C-USA.
When the fall of 2003 rolled around for USF to begin C- USA play, a seismic shifting of the conferences was occurring. Suddenly, USF was a possible target of the Big East.
``USF hit all of the hot buttons, the pressure points of what their criteria was [for a future member],'' said Kevin O'Malley, a sports media consultant for the Big East.
While Memphis, East Carolina, UCF and Marshall bombarded the Big East with telephone calls and letters, USF decided to take a completely different approach.
The Bulls waited for the Big East to contact them.
``All the other schools were taking a slick PR approach, and Lee Roy [Selmon] said this is not how to do it,'' said Michael Rierson, USF's vice president for advancement.
Not surprisingly, Selmon, the former AD who is now president of USF's Foundation for Athletics, downplayed his role.
``We did not believe we needed to go out and do a big marketing campaign and try to push ourselves into the [Big East] commissioner's office and force our way into being a member,'' Selmon said. ``I believed in being above board, sincere and doing it with integrity. I think that's the way to do business.''
In September 2003 - even before USF made its C-USA debut at Army - Tranghese called Selmon to tell him that the Big East could only take Louisville and Cincinnati. But he believed there would be another opening soon. Very soon.
``I know it must have been hard on them,'' Tranghese said. ``But the fact they just sat and waited for us to give them a signal was very impressive.''
Fateful Meeting
Tranghese was having a great Sunday. It was Oct. 12, 2003, and he had just finished a meeting with Big East presidents and Louisville and Cincinnati representatives to informally invite the schools to replace Miami and Virginia Tech.
Tranghese was floating through the Pittsburgh airport when his cell phone rang. It was Boston College president William P. Leahy. Father Leahy gives Tranghese the news he had been expecting: BC is leaving for the ACC.
The next morning, Tranghese called Selmon. They set up a meeting four days later on Oct. 17 in Newark, N.J.
That Friday, the charter jet left sunny Clearwater for New Jersey. In three hours, the plane's passengers - USF president Judy Genshaft, Selmon and Rierson - would meet with three Big East presidents and Tranghese in one of the most significant meetings in the school's 47-year history.
Halfway through the flight, Genshaft is passing time by working on some paperwork. Rierson admits he's ``nervous as a cat'' and paces the aisle like a wind-up toy robot. Selmon prepares for the meeting the same way he did on game days during his Hall of Fame careers with Oklahoma and the Tampa Bay Bucs.
He's sound asleep.
``Actually,'' Selmon said, ``I was just resting with my eyes closed.''
The meeting at the Newark Marriott with the Big East presidents and Tranghese lasts two hours. ``But it seems like it went on forever,'' Rierson said.
The presidents are impressed with USF.
``Judy was fabulous in the meeting,'' Tranghese said. ``I could tell within 15 minutes there was a tremendous comfort level with the presidents.''
Genshaft, who declined interview requests for this story, Selmon and Rierson board the plane for the flight home. Once the wheels are up, Rierson asks Genshaft and Selmon their thoughts on the meeting.
Everyone breaks into big smiles.
Less than 48 hours later, the Big East membership conducts a conference call. Once the call is completed that Sunday night, Tranghese - exactly one week after he learned Boston College was leaving - contacts Genshaft and Selmon. He extends a Big East invitation to USF.
``In an atmosphere of chaos and complications, son of a gun if it all didn't come together for USF,'' Rierson said. ``This will have economic and academic benefits for decades.''
The former commuter school on Fowler Avenue, turned down three times by Conference USA and then forced to wait another two years, was Big East-bound.
``Paul Griffin was the dynamic kick-starter of all those things [that led to the Big East], and Lee Roy tied up the package,'' said softball coach Ken Eriksen, who has been at USF since 1985. ``The dynamic duo of Betty Castor and Paul Griffin were the fuel behind the program.''
Raising A New Flag
Outside the administrative offices at 10 this morning, Genshaft and Athletic Director Doug Woolard will raise a Big East flag signifying USF's new conference membership. Some cynics suggest USF - restricted by one of the Big East's lowest athletic budgets and competing in arguably the nation's top men's basketball conference - should instead raise a white flag.
Woolard, who has been at USF only 13 months, is ready.
``It's as much a challenge as an opportunity,'' Woolard said. ``I look at the glass half- full and the opportunities our student-athletes will have to play at the very highest level. It will change the people we can recruit and our fans can see the highest level of competition.
``We don't have the history or tradition of the other schools. As a new member of the Big East we don't look just to survive, we look to succeed.''
Selmon also is excited about the opportunity.
``I'm amazed how things have unfolded, and it's not over,'' said Selmon, the athletic department's chief fundraiser. ``It's just starting. I pray and hope the community sees it that way and gets ready for the next steps.
``We're ready to climb, and we want them to climb with us. And we need them to climb those steps with us.''
This story can be found at: <a href='http://bulls.tbo.com/bulls/MGBRHI3TMAE.html' target='_blank'>http://bulls.tbo.com/bulls/MGBRHI3TMAE.html</a>
:laugh: :laugh:
