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Tireless Holtz demonstrates a zest for life
(October 25, 2006) ? Forty years ago, Lou Holtz took pen to paper and wrote down 108 things he wanted to experience in his life.
Among the wishes he's been able to cross off the list:
Have dinner at the White House.
Parachute out of an airplane.
Write a best-selling book.
Coach a college football team to the national championship.
"We've been able to do 102 things," the former Notre Dame football coach and current ESPN analyst said. "I still haven't run with the bulls in Pamplona (Spain) or gone on an African picture safari. But, Lord willing, there's still time."
I just hope Holtz has left room to add a few more items to that list because this hyper 69-year-old shows no signs of slowing down.
"I don't want to get greedy," jokes Holtz, the featured speaker at today's Compeer Sports Luncheon at the Riverside Convention Center. "I've already done more than I thought possible or deserved."
Of all the experiences he's had, nothing influenced him more profoundly than the 11 years he spent at Notre Dame. He inherited a struggling program, and woke up the echoes of coaching legends Rockne, Leahy and Parseghian while leading the Irish to a national title in 1988.
Holtz had coached at Ohio State and Arkansas and in the NFL with the New York Jets, but none of those stops could hold a grotto candle to his time in South Bend.
"It's a special, special place, and I'm not just talking about the great football tradition there," Holtz said. "They not only educate, they formulate. By that, I mean that they formulate leaders and caring people ? people with values and character."
Holtz's three children graduated from the university, and he and his wife plan to be buried there.
"If you've been to Notre Dame, no explanation is necessary," he said. "And if you haven't been there, no explanation will suffice."
When he retired from the school following the 1996 season, he never expected to coach again. But those who knew the restless Holtz knew better. He wound up taking over a moribund South Carolina program in 1999, and resuscitating it, just as he had during head-coaching stints at William & Mary, North Carolina State, Arkansas and Notre Dame.
Sadly, his illustrious career ended on a down note in 2004. During his final game, the Gamecocks got into a bench-emptying altercation with rival Clemson. It was reminiscent of, though not quite as brutal as, the recent row between Miami and Florida International.
"It is humiliating and embarrassing to have your school get caught up in a riot like that," Holtz said. "I obviously wasn't proud that it happened, but I was proud of the way we reacted to it afterwards. Both Clemson and us were scheduled to go to bowl games after that game, but we decided it was in the best interest of our schools and college football if we declined the invitations. We took strong measures to punish ourselves because you just can't condone that type of behavior."
Holtz misses the camaraderie and relationships associated with coaching young men. But he has no interest in returning to the profession he practiced for nearly five decades as a head coach and assistant. That part of his life is over, and the void is being filled by numerous ventures.
Holtz is enjoying his work as an ESPN analyst, and continues to travel the country giving motivational speeches and promoting his fifth book, published this fall.
He continues to advocate for a college football playoff system.
"I'd like to see the four top teams play after you've played all the bowl games," Holtz said. "Eventually that will happen, but for some reason the NCAA and the college presidents don't want it to happen right now. At some point, the pressure will be too much for them to continue to resist."
He's not surprised the Big East Conference has bounced back from the defections of Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College to the ACC, and he believes Syracuse will reemerge as a power in the not-so-distant future.
"I think they've shown a lot of progress this season, already, having won three games and playing Iowa and Louisville tough," he said. "They just have to do a better job recruiting players in the East ? players they've been losing to places like BC, Penn State and Rutgers in recent years."
Count Holtz among those pleased with the job Charlie Weis has done at Notre Dame.
"It's just too bad they lost that game to Michigan in game two," he said. "But if you are going to lose, it's better to lose early. They could still be in the national championship game, but they're going to have to run the table ? which I believe they can ? and they are going to have to count on some people to lose."
Holtz, who turns 70 on Jan. 6, remains a man in constant motion. He loves following college football and delivering humorous, uplifting speeches about the lessons he has learned, on and off the field.
His zest for life remains robust.
I've got a strong feeling he'll need to expand that list before all's said and done.
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