Jan. 23, 2008

By Tyler Blue

History will remember Coach Mike Kelly for his impeccable records and achievements. An .819 career winning percentage, three national championships, a seven-time National Coach of the Year and 26 winning seasons in his 27 years at the University of Dayton--these are numbers legends themselves look up to.

But to me, he will be remembered more for who he was than for what he did.

I played for Coach Kelly during the final four years of his coaching career. To say my personal successes as a player paled in comparison to his personal successes as a coach would be the ultimate understatement. As a safety, I started a grand total of three games, had zero career interceptions and made only a handful of tackles. Perhaps I will go down in history as the most un-athletic defensive back in school history. Some linemen had better shuttle times than I.

No class of players experienced the full gamut of emotions than the senior class of the 2007 team went through. In 2006, one year after a 9-1 campaign, we finished 4-6, the school's first losing record in 30 years. Now, I had come from a high school situation where I won a total of four games in three years of varsity football, so I knew what consistent losing felt like, but that 2006 season was different. We were blind-sided by a blitz nobody saw coming and nobody knew how to stop. Dayton Football, the entire program, reached a crossroads that year. How we responded would define not only us as a class, but maybe even Kelly's final legacy.

How we responded tells you a little about what Mike Kelly is all about.

Let me tell you a story. The Friday before each home game we meet in the evenings as a team and have what we call a team function. Some times we will watch a movie, other times we will go to a volleyball game, but every year, during the function before our second-to-last home game, the freshmen will put on skits. There are no rules to these, and everyone--everyone--is fair game. Coach Kelly is in attendance, however.

Well, here we are in the midst of a four-game conference losing streak, on the brink of securing Kelly's first ever losing season, and it's the week of skits. The final group definitely crosses the line in their portrayal of their head coach, and as he walked to the front of the team to say his final words before he dismissed us, there was a definite awkwardness among the players. Would he berate the "pups" who put on this sketch? Would he give an angry lecture about the attitude of the team? No, he cracked a joke about himself that literally made some of the guys roll on the ground with laughter.

I can't imagine too many college coaches who would have handled that situation in such a positive way. I know full and well I wouldn't have. But nothing about Mike Kelly's personality says "legendary football coach" - only his actions.

After that 2006 season, of course there were whispers among the team that the game had passed coach by. Our offense was out-of-date and our defensive schemes too simple. We really had no idea what to expect for the 2007 season, but we didn't expect many wholesale changes. We were wrong.

In the off-season we put in an entirely new offense that went against 30 plus years of tradition. It was akin to Nebraska abandoning the triple option for Bill Callahan's pro-style offense. And, for a coaching staff who had lived and died with the old system, it was completely unexpected. On the defensive side of the ball, coach made minor adjustments that made a great deal of difference. For coach to humble himself and accept that change was needed is a great testimony to his lack of ego and his willingness to always learn something new.

So it's the 2007 season, and we started it off great, winning our four non-conference games including a victory at Fordham, who later qualified for the FCS (formerly 1-AA) playoffs. Then we lose our first PFL game to Morehead State, and everyone is thinking, "Oh no, is this going to be like last year?"

As we exit the bus coach tells us he wants to talk to us as a team. As we all gather in the hallway of the locker room, the mood was as somber as a funeral. Coach told us that sport is full of ups and downs, and we had to decide right then how we would respond. Would we go on a losing streak like the season before, or would we learn from that experience?

Six weeks later we clinched the PFL championship and secured a spot in the Gridiron Classic. I think the biggest difference was trust. In 2006, we didn't trust ourselves or the system we were playing. This past year, we knew we had something special, and we weren't going to let it slip away. Credit Coach Kelly for that fundamental change in demeanor.

Only a very small percentage of high school football players get the opportunity to play college football, and for that opportunity I consider myself extremely blessed. But an even smaller percentage of college football players are lucky enough to play for a coach like Mike Kelly, and it will be a long time before I fully appreciate the magnitude of my fortune.

One of coach's most used sayings was "right place, right time." He gave us that warning after every game, and the many other occasions he felt some of his players might be in danger of wondering into trouble (football players will be football players). But now that both he and I are retired, those words take on a new meaning to me. Because for four years of my life, as a member of the University of Dayton football team head-coached by Mike Kelly, I was truly in the right place at the right time.

Thank you coach, for the wonderful memories.