Down to the Wire
February 05, 2003 06:56 PM | General
February 5, 2003
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Herb Hand sat back in his chair and glanced at his half-empty bottle of Pepcid AC and the stack of video tapes scattered about on the floor. He took a deep breath.
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| Herb Hand works the telephones Wednesday morning at the Milan Puskar Center. (All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks) |
“I’ve been eating these things like candy the last couple of days,” sighed West Virginia's recruiting coordinator. “We’re idiots. We’re putting our livelihoods in the hands of 18-year-old kids.”
On Tuesday night, Hand made his last call to Mountaineer coach Rich Rodriguez around 9:30 p.m. and told him things appeared to be okay. Rodriguez knew better. In the recruiting business, that could mean just about anything.
Hand was responsible for defensive back Vince Beamer -- a player that still hadn’t made up his mind by the time Hand kissed his wife goodnight and tried to get some sleep.
Light soon streaked through his window Wednesday morning: he was still awake. He splashed some water on his face, got dressed quickly and jumped into his car and made it to the Puskar Center by 6:30 a.m. He was dressed casually in a bright yellow jacket, khaki pants, t-shirt and sneakers. Might as well be comfortable, he thought.
Some of the coaches were already there. Like Hand, they couldn’t stand the torture of staying in bed. If there was a catastrophe, at least they were at the Puskar Center when the bad news came in.
After some coffee and a light breakfast, some of them positioned themselves near the fax machine waiting for the first faxes to start rolling in at 7 a.m.
Others may not have been close by, but they made sure to walk through every once in a while to see how many of their players had sent in their letters.
To lighten the mood, some coaches actually bet on which fax will come in first. Hand says they don’t do that at WVU and he isn’t sure which one was first, although he thinks it may have been Pittsburgh defensive back Eric Wicks.
Hand's mind was on Beamer, a player who made a commitment to Pitt over the holiday break before coming to West Virginia on a weekend visit just before signing day. Hand still had no idea what Beamer was going to do.
Last year, it was defensive backs coach Tony Gibson who went through the misery of having to come down to the wire on some talented prospects. Gibson got bad news on every single one of them.
"Tony had it rough last year," Hand shook his head.
About two hours into it Hand finally got the call he was waiting for. He gently put the Pepcid AC bottle back on his desk.
“Merry Christmas,” joked Beamer’s high school coach.
“I was about ready to throw up before that call,” said Hand. “It’s fun when you get them. It’s not too fun when they go somewhere else.”
Beamer’s letter finally arrived at 10:30 a.m. and there were some high-fives when the fax machine finally spat out his scholarship paper. The class of 2003 was nearly complete.
By noon all of the faxes have arrived: Hand is now ready to call the sports information office and notify them to finish preparing the news release for Coach Rich Rodriguez’ press conference at 3 p.m.
Sometimes it’s not that easy. During Hand's first year as West Virginia’s recruiting coordinator, Rodriguez was nearly finished with his press conference when the assistant burst into the meeting room to give Rodriguez the word that defensive tackle Kelvin DuBouse had signed.
“(Assistant head coach) Rick Trickett worked the phones hard on that one,” said Hand. “He battled that one right down to the end.”
Defensive back Adam “Pac-Man” Jones went to his high school signing ceremony wearing a Georgia Tech ball cap. Before he announced his decision, he took off the cap and put on a West Virginia hat.
“We didn’t know he was going to do that,” said Hand.
Those were recruiting battles West Virginia won.
Hand has also been on the other side plenty of times, too.
Once while he was at Clemson, a prospect ran down the hill crying telling him he was coming to Clemson. A week later that same kid saw the hedges at Georgia and started crying and told them he was going there. The recruit wound up going to Tennessee.
“I guess he must have cried harder at Tennessee,” Hand laughed.
College recruiting is a serious business and Hand cautions that it is very difficult not to get attached to the young men they spend so much time courting.
“I always equate it to when we first moved to Morgantown,” he explained. “When were looking for our house, I told my wife not to get emotionally attached to it until the papers are signed and the contract is done. It’s the same way with recruiting. You try not to be emotionally attached to the kids until they sign. But you like them.”
Hand’s guard is still up. Coaches do get attached to kids and it does hurt when they choose other schools. He knows that all too well.
“You’re building relationships over the course of seven-eight months,” he said. “Sometimes it can be longer than that.”
Looking back on this particular group of signees, Hand is pleased that the coaching staff was able to agree on the best 24 players they could sign.
“What’s great about our staff right now is that we’ve got nine guys who recruit an area and all of us are recruiting for Mountaineer football; I’m not recruiting for Herb Hand,” he said. “We’re all trying to get the best kids to come here. As long as we’re getting the best kids to come here and win, that’s who we’ll take. It doesn’t matter how many players a particular coach gets.”
Rodriguez was in the middle of his press conference remarks talking about West Virginia’s newest group of football recruits when Hand stopped in and listened for a little bit. It was a brief moment for him to reflect before he returned to his office to deal with the large stack of tapes sitting on the floor.
The tapes were of high school juniors from New Jersey.
Not far away was his trusty bottle of Pepcid AC. He sat down in his chair and turned on the VCR.
It was time to start recruiting for the class of 2004.
