Gillespie: Playmakers Play
February 15, 2011 10:34 PM | General
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Robert Gillespie is a self-proclaimed no-nonsense guy, and it was his tell-it-like-it-is approach that helped West Virginia sign one of the top high school running backs in the country in Jacksonville’s Andrew Buie earlier this month.
Even on signing day when Buie was getting hammered by other schools – some telling him that Gillespie was going to take the running backs job at his alma mater, Florida – Gillespie made it clear that he was sticking with his guy Dana Holgorsen at WVU.
Gillespie firmly believes Holgorsen is on a collision course with greatness at West Virginia, and that’s a big reason why he chose to follow him halfway across the country from Oklahoma State last month. Another reason Gillespie had the Mayflower guys over to pack up his things once again for the move to West Virginia was because Holgorsen is such a great guy to be around.
“We have to have fun,” Gillespie said last week. “I have a wife and a daughter and I have to be excited about coming to work. That’s what I feel like I have here, and that’s the culture that Dana wants to have around here.”
Gillespie, a running back for Steve Spurrier at the University of Florida in the late 1990s who helped the Gators to a pair of SEC titles and four bowl appearances, has compiled an impressive coaching résumé in the relatively short amount of time he was been a full-time college coach.
During his four-year stint on Spurrier’s staff at South Carolina from 2005-08, Gillespie helped the Gamecocks to three bowl appearances, and in 2006 his running backs accounted for nearly 1,900 yards rushing, more than doubling the rushing production of South Carolina’s rushers from the previous year.
In 2009, Gillespie chose to spread his wings and join the Oklahoma State staff where he eventually hooked up with Holgorsen. Last year, Gillespie was involved with one of the most dynamic offenses in the country, his running backs playing an integral role in the Cowboys’ success.
Starter Kendall Hunter finished the season with 1,548 yards rushing and 16 touchdowns, earning consensus All-America honors and becoming a finalist for the Doak Walker Award as college football’s top running back. Hunter’s backup, Joseph Randle, was also extremely productive, gaining more than 1,100 all-purpose yards as a true freshman.
What Gillespie proved by using those two players the way he did at Oklahoma State is that he will find ways to get his playmakers on the football field, no matter how young or old they are.
“Can they make plays? That’s what it’s all about – putting guys on the field who can make plays,” he explained. “We’re going to put the best playmaker out there and if we don’t have one then we’ve got to go find one.”
Gillespie may have taken care of that on signing day by inking Buie and Dustin Garrison, another prolific high school runner from the Houston suburbs.
In Buie, Gillespie is getting one of the top ball carriers in the Sunshine State who ran for more than 1,700 yards and scored 26 touchdowns for Class A state champion Trinity Christian Academy. Buie rushed for 242 yards and scored four touchdowns in the state championship game.
The 5-foot-8, 191-pounder was everybody’s recruiting target, some schools pursuing him for more than two years, and yet somehow Gillespie was able to make up lost ground at the end to get Buie to pick gold and blue as his school colors for the next four years
“I was really fortunate to be able to develop a relationship with that kid,” Gillespie said. “His attitude is phenomenal.”
Gillespie actually had two connections with Buie, one, his former Florida teammate Guss Scott was an assistant coach on Trinity Christian’s staff and the other also happened to be Scott, who is the older brother of former WVU safety Boogie Allen.
“I had no idea Gus was there so I was blessed, and those were also the words (Andrew) said to me, ‘You know, coach, everything happens for a reason.’ And it did,” Gillespie said. “I was able to get in there and meet him and his family and I loved his attitude.”
Gillespie also loves Garrison’s attitude. Despite standing 5-feet-8 and weighing just 160 pounds, Garrison blew up during his senior season at Pearland High, one of the real powerhouse programs in Texas. Garrison was one of the most productive running backs in the state, gaining a ridiculous 2,842 yards and scoring 46 touchdowns during his senior season. He ran for 124 yards and scored three TDs in the Texas Class 5A state championship game.
Because of the way recruiting is done in the Southwest with many of the top prospects committing to schools during the summertime before their senior seasons, the fact that Garrison was still available for West Virginia in January was almost like the Mountaineers hitting the Powerball. Go on YouTube and watch his senior highlight video (it’s 14 minutes long) and see how he finishes runs, his ball skills in the passing game and how he never gets caught when he’s out in space. His highlights look similar to another undersized and somewhat overlooked high school player who turned out OK in college - Steve Slaton.
Naturally Gillespie won’t touch that comparison with a 10-foot pole, but he does like what he sees in Garrison.
“Yeah, he’s fast enough, I guess, and that’s all that matters to me,” Gillespie said.
Gillespie is convinced that if Garrison had played in Florida or along the East coast where the kids wait longer to commit to schools, he would have been much more highly recruited. Still, Pitt tried to come in late and snag him as did Washington State.
“The kid was the 5A player of the year,” Gillespie said. “His team won the state championship and he had just phenomenal numbers. He’s a physical, tough kid. He can catch the ball. He can run the ball – he carried the ball over 300-some times this year.”
Can those two come in and compete for a starting job right away when fall camp starts next August? Gillespie thinks so.
“I signed these two freshmen and I said, ‘Hey, I want you to come in here and take the job.’ If you’re good enough to play you can play,” Gillespie said. “Last year, I had a senior and a true freshman and my true freshman had over 1,100 all-purpose yards. He came in with the mindset of I want to play. If you come in with that mindset, and you put in the time watching film and try to learn the offense, I want you to play. My job is to put the best players on the field and not worry about what classification he is.”
Of West Virginia’s returning runners, Gillespie will get a better idea of what’s he’s got to work with this spring when they get out on the field. He doesn’t have much else to go on because Noel Devine got the majority of the reps in 2010.
“There isn’t a lot of tape of these guys playing much,” Gillespie said. “Trey Johnson is a young guy who didn’t play a lot. I know the guys are excited about him having a chance of being a player, but there is not a lot of film of him. Ryan Clarke played a little bit and Shawne Alston got some spot duty, but the main guy was Noel and I think they realize that, hey, this is my chance. Somebody has to step up and be the guy and they know they have that opportunity.”
Whoever that guy turns out to be, he is going to be playing in an offense designed to get the football into the hands of its playmakers. Gillespie envisions exciting times in Morgantown in the coming years with Dana Holgorsen on the headsets calling the plays.
“If you come to a place where the culture is already there and the kids want to win, I think it’s easy to establish and develop our system and that’s what makes this place so exciting,” he said. “This place has won and these kids want to win, so hopefully they will buy into what we’re trying to teach them. If they spend time watching film on their own, then I think we’ve got a chance to put it together here.”
Buckle up Mountaineer fans, because things could be getting really interesting around here pretty soon.
Even on signing day when Buie was getting hammered by other schools – some telling him that Gillespie was going to take the running backs job at his alma mater, Florida – Gillespie made it clear that he was sticking with his guy Dana Holgorsen at WVU.
Gillespie firmly believes Holgorsen is on a collision course with greatness at West Virginia, and that’s a big reason why he chose to follow him halfway across the country from Oklahoma State last month. Another reason Gillespie had the Mayflower guys over to pack up his things once again for the move to West Virginia was because Holgorsen is such a great guy to be around.
“We have to have fun,” Gillespie said last week. “I have a wife and a daughter and I have to be excited about coming to work. That’s what I feel like I have here, and that’s the culture that Dana wants to have around here.”
Gillespie, a running back for Steve Spurrier at the University of Florida in the late 1990s who helped the Gators to a pair of SEC titles and four bowl appearances, has compiled an impressive coaching résumé in the relatively short amount of time he was been a full-time college coach.
During his four-year stint on Spurrier’s staff at South Carolina from 2005-08, Gillespie helped the Gamecocks to three bowl appearances, and in 2006 his running backs accounted for nearly 1,900 yards rushing, more than doubling the rushing production of South Carolina’s rushers from the previous year.
In 2009, Gillespie chose to spread his wings and join the Oklahoma State staff where he eventually hooked up with Holgorsen. Last year, Gillespie was involved with one of the most dynamic offenses in the country, his running backs playing an integral role in the Cowboys’ success.
Starter Kendall Hunter finished the season with 1,548 yards rushing and 16 touchdowns, earning consensus All-America honors and becoming a finalist for the Doak Walker Award as college football’s top running back. Hunter’s backup, Joseph Randle, was also extremely productive, gaining more than 1,100 all-purpose yards as a true freshman.
What Gillespie proved by using those two players the way he did at Oklahoma State is that he will find ways to get his playmakers on the football field, no matter how young or old they are.
“Can they make plays? That’s what it’s all about – putting guys on the field who can make plays,” he explained. “We’re going to put the best playmaker out there and if we don’t have one then we’ve got to go find one.”
Gillespie may have taken care of that on signing day by inking Buie and Dustin Garrison, another prolific high school runner from the Houston suburbs.
In Buie, Gillespie is getting one of the top ball carriers in the Sunshine State who ran for more than 1,700 yards and scored 26 touchdowns for Class A state champion Trinity Christian Academy. Buie rushed for 242 yards and scored four touchdowns in the state championship game.
The 5-foot-8, 191-pounder was everybody’s recruiting target, some schools pursuing him for more than two years, and yet somehow Gillespie was able to make up lost ground at the end to get Buie to pick gold and blue as his school colors for the next four years
“I was really fortunate to be able to develop a relationship with that kid,” Gillespie said. “His attitude is phenomenal.”
Gillespie actually had two connections with Buie, one, his former Florida teammate Guss Scott was an assistant coach on Trinity Christian’s staff and the other also happened to be Scott, who is the older brother of former WVU safety Boogie Allen.
“I had no idea Gus was there so I was blessed, and those were also the words (Andrew) said to me, ‘You know, coach, everything happens for a reason.’ And it did,” Gillespie said. “I was able to get in there and meet him and his family and I loved his attitude.”
Gillespie also loves Garrison’s attitude. Despite standing 5-feet-8 and weighing just 160 pounds, Garrison blew up during his senior season at Pearland High, one of the real powerhouse programs in Texas. Garrison was one of the most productive running backs in the state, gaining a ridiculous 2,842 yards and scoring 46 touchdowns during his senior season. He ran for 124 yards and scored three TDs in the Texas Class 5A state championship game.
Because of the way recruiting is done in the Southwest with many of the top prospects committing to schools during the summertime before their senior seasons, the fact that Garrison was still available for West Virginia in January was almost like the Mountaineers hitting the Powerball. Go on YouTube and watch his senior highlight video (it’s 14 minutes long) and see how he finishes runs, his ball skills in the passing game and how he never gets caught when he’s out in space. His highlights look similar to another undersized and somewhat overlooked high school player who turned out OK in college - Steve Slaton.
Naturally Gillespie won’t touch that comparison with a 10-foot pole, but he does like what he sees in Garrison.
“Yeah, he’s fast enough, I guess, and that’s all that matters to me,” Gillespie said.
Gillespie is convinced that if Garrison had played in Florida or along the East coast where the kids wait longer to commit to schools, he would have been much more highly recruited. Still, Pitt tried to come in late and snag him as did Washington State.
“The kid was the 5A player of the year,” Gillespie said. “His team won the state championship and he had just phenomenal numbers. He’s a physical, tough kid. He can catch the ball. He can run the ball – he carried the ball over 300-some times this year.”
Can those two come in and compete for a starting job right away when fall camp starts next August? Gillespie thinks so.
“I signed these two freshmen and I said, ‘Hey, I want you to come in here and take the job.’ If you’re good enough to play you can play,” Gillespie said. “Last year, I had a senior and a true freshman and my true freshman had over 1,100 all-purpose yards. He came in with the mindset of I want to play. If you come in with that mindset, and you put in the time watching film and try to learn the offense, I want you to play. My job is to put the best players on the field and not worry about what classification he is.”
Of West Virginia’s returning runners, Gillespie will get a better idea of what’s he’s got to work with this spring when they get out on the field. He doesn’t have much else to go on because Noel Devine got the majority of the reps in 2010.
“There isn’t a lot of tape of these guys playing much,” Gillespie said. “Trey Johnson is a young guy who didn’t play a lot. I know the guys are excited about him having a chance of being a player, but there is not a lot of film of him. Ryan Clarke played a little bit and Shawne Alston got some spot duty, but the main guy was Noel and I think they realize that, hey, this is my chance. Somebody has to step up and be the guy and they know they have that opportunity.”
Whoever that guy turns out to be, he is going to be playing in an offense designed to get the football into the hands of its playmakers. Gillespie envisions exciting times in Morgantown in the coming years with Dana Holgorsen on the headsets calling the plays.
“If you come to a place where the culture is already there and the kids want to win, I think it’s easy to establish and develop our system and that’s what makes this place so exciting,” he said. “This place has won and these kids want to win, so hopefully they will buy into what we’re trying to teach them. If they spend time watching film on their own, then I think we’ve got a chance to put it together here.”
Buckle up Mountaineer fans, because things could be getting really interesting around here pretty soon.
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