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'L' IS FOR LAME DUCK: MSU coach fired, but he will finish the season
WHAT WENT WRONG: Irish debacle start of downfall
November 2, 2006
BY SHANNON SHELTON
FREE PRESS SPORTS WRITER
MSU coach John L. Smith did not attend the news conference but spoke later. "I love these guys, I'm gonna miss 'em," he said of his players.
EAST LANSING -- Michigan State announced Wednesday that head football coach John L. Smith will not return next season.
MSU president Lou Anna Simon and athletic director Ron Mason, along with Board of Trustees chairman David Porteous and vice chairman Joel Ferguson, delivered the announcement at an afternoon news conference. Simon and Mason made the decision to release Smith earlier Wednesday.
Mason said Smith was asked to remain as head coach for MSU's final three regular-season games and a potential bowl game. Smith accepted.
"He did this with class," Mason said. "He cares a lot about his student-athletes, he cares a lot about his assistant coaches, and he cares a lot about Michigan State."
Smith briefly spoke with reporters early Wednesday evening.
"As we return to the practice field, we've got three games to go," Smith said. "If we play the best that we can, and that's what we're gonna do, hopefully we can get a little reward and go to a bowl game. And if we get to go to a bowl game, which we're gonna get done, then it'll be a heck of a going-away party."
After two consecutive losing seasons, Smith entered 2006 with a mandate from the administration, particularly Simon, who said last year that Smith would be evaluated this season on his ability to move the program forward.
Initially, Smith appeared to be fulfilling that goal. The Spartans opened 3-0 and entered their nationally televised home game against Notre Dame coming off a solid 38-23 win over Pittsburgh.
But MSU surrendered a 17-point lead to Notre Dame on its way to a 40-37 loss, starting a four-game spiral that also included losses to Illinois, Michigan and Ohio State.
A fifth loss appeared likely when MSU fell behind, 38-3, against Northwestern on Oct. 21, but the Spartans mounted the largest comeback in Division I-A football history to win, 41-38.
That wasn't enough to turn around MSU's season, however, and the Spartans fell behind, 46-7, against Indiana before getting two fourth-quarter scores to finish with a 46-21 loss.
"There's a lot of things that happened," Ferguson said. "The Notre Dame game broke everyone's heart, the Illinois game broke everybody's spirit, Ohio (State) broke everybody's legs. Just a lot of things that happened, really. Just a perfect storm. That's what really happened. These last six weeks have been a perfect storm."
Smith also has dealt with off-field issues and a worsening public perception over the past six weeks, a period in which MSU compiled a 1-5 record. During his news conference following the Illinois loss, Smith admitted that his players were unprepared and emotionally flat after a week of practice.
When asked why, he responded, "Apparently, I don't have the answers."
Smith finished the news conference by slapping himself in the face to mock Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis' assertion a week earlier that he'd been hit in a sideline tussle against MSU, but the image of Smith's action attracted national ridicule from media and fans.
It was an incident similar to one in 2005, when Smith's halftime outburst following a botched field-goal attempt against Ohio State became fodder for endless audio and video loops.
Player discipline, which had been considered improved from Bobby Williams' period as head coach, also suffered this season. Six athletes have been removed from the team this year for disciplinary issues, and four of those six are facing assault charges in Ingham and Clinton counties.
But Mason, who turned down all media interview requests this season, saying he wouldn't make any midseason evaluations, didn't specify one factor that pushed him to dismiss Smith.
"There was no real tipping point," Mason said. "We've had this under discussion for quite some time. I really feel the performance on the field hasn't lived up to what we hoped it would."
In almost four full seasons at MSU, Smith is 22-23, including this year's 4-5 record. He went 8-5 in his first season in 2003, which included a loss in the Alamo Bowl.
MSU missed the postseason in 2004 and 2005, the first two-year stretch since 1991-92 the Spartans didn't make a bowl game. MSU needs two wins in its last three games to become bowl-eligible this year and avoid a third consecutive postseason absence. That hasn't occurred at MSU since 1981-83.
In his four seasons, Smith is 0-8 against Michigan and Ohio State, and can count losses to Louisiana Tech in 2003, a struggling Rutgers team in 2004, and Illinois and Indiana this year among his more embarrassing defeats.
"I think all of the factors entered in," Simon said when asked about Smith's conduct, record and player issues. "We worry about academics, we worry about the off-the-field behavior, the way in which the student-athletes are treated, we worry about fan commitment and support, alumni commitment and support, which comes with the presentation of the program by both the coaches and the students. (So) it was a factor."
In 2003, Smith was credited with reviving a team decimated by suspensions and poor discipline under Williams, who was fired with three games left in the 2002 season. Smith helped quarterback Jeff Smoker, who had been taken off the team in 2002 for substance-abuse issues, return for a successful senior campaign in which the Spartans started 7-1.
That period seemed to soothe some concern surrounding his hiring. Few outside of the inner circles of the MSU administration knew Smith would be the new head coach until word got out during halftime of the 2002 GMAC Bowl, where Smith's Louisville squad was in the middle of a 38-15 loss to Marshall.
"The first day he was here, he was criticized by a lot of people," Mason said. "Maybe because they didn't know who he was and his track record, and that's a tough way to get started. From that time on, it was a battle to try to get the class size equal. It was a battle to bring in quality kids that could play.
"There's a lot of things that end up being answers when you look back at it, but I think overall, what I looked at is, is the situation improving? And for the most part, for what we wanted, it is. But let's not kid yourself. At a level like this, you still have to win games."
MSU will have to pay Smith more than $4 million to buy out his six-year contract, which paid him $1.6 million a year.
"We looked at the cost of making a decision today and not making a decision today," Simon said. "In our collective judgment ... it's all doable. It is difficult. There's no one standing here who wouldn't have wished for a better outcome."
Simon and Mason said they would be the only individuals charged with selecting a new coach, and the trustees said they would support their decision. Porteous and Ferguson said their presence at the news conference was designed to show that the administration and the board would be working together throughout the search process -- a level of cooperation that hasn't been present in the past.
"We recognize mistakes we've made in the past and we're not stupid," Ferguson said. "We learned from those mistakes, and we're not going to make the same mistakes again. We might pick the wrong coach again, but it's not going to be because we're not all working together for what's best for Michigan State."
