VISIONARY ACHIEVER - Turner Gill

[Eric the Red]

*****All Turner Gill articles whether directly associated with Nebraska or not stay in this forum. He is one of the greatest Huskers of all time. Why? Becasue I say so****

 

VISIONARY ACHIEVER

 

Cover Story: Coach Turner Gill follows his heart and his faith, and they have led him to both storybook success and the University at Buffalo

 

By BOB DICESARE

Buffalo News Sports Reporter

8/24/2006

 

 

Turner Gill went 28-2 as a starting quarterback for Nebraska in the 1980s, landing him on the All-America team and among the Heisman Trophy finalists.

 

Turner Gill went 28-2 as a starter at Nebraska, twice finished top three in the national polls, played for a national championship.

 

The University at Buffalo is 10-69 in its modern-day Division I era, never having won more than two conference games in a season.

 

Gill was an All-American, a Heisman Trophy finalist, the quarterback on the Big Eight All-Decade Team of the 1980s.

 

UB once had - hold your applause, please - the Mid-American Conference Freshman of the Year.

 

Gill is said to be one of the three most popular residents in the history of Nebraska, a member of a triumvirate that includes Tom Osborne, the former Cornhuskers coach and current Nebraska congressman, and Johnny Carson, the late-night talk show icon.

 

UB has yet to carve out a football identity in its own backyard. Check that. Not even on its own campus.

 

It's readily apparent why UB, its football program still embryonic, sought out someone of Gill's pedigree to bring it to life. His character, friends say, is beyond reproach. His recruiting talents are immense. Two Heisman Trophy finalists, including 2001 winner Eric Crouch, emerged and three national titles were won while Gill served as the Huskers' quarterbacks coach. It's no wonder UB football realized an instant and profound boost in recognition the day Gill was hired. Imagine. Parents of high school players have been calling the university to ask what it will take to get their sons in the door.

 

What's puzzling is why Gill, having experienced college football at the height of its splendor during 19 years as a player and coach, would migrate to Buffalo to oversee a program that's been awash in detriments, in a town where pro football has a stranglehold on the local psyche.

 

He spent last season with the Green Bay Packers, serving as player development director and an offensive assistant. He was inside the NFL culture, primed to move up the ranks toward quarterbacks coach, or offensive coordinator, maybe head coach or general manager eventually. What could he have seen in UB that would lead him, at age 43, to uproot his wife and two daughters and reshape his career?

 

There are multiple answers, some simple, some complex. What Gill observes in UB is potential, which is old news, and commitment, which is a breakthrough. The university has, in the young tenures of President John Simpson and Athletics Director Warde Manuel, identified what's requisite to cultivating a viable Division I program and moved to fill the vacancies. A new weight room is under construction. The push is on for an indoor practice facility adjacent to the football stadium. The nonconference schedule, which this season includes games at Auburn, Boston College and Wisconsin, is intended to expand the program's budget through appearance fees, today's lumps feeding tomorrow's promise, short-term pain for long-term gain.

 

"There's a plan," Gill said. "Show me what you're going to do differently from the past five, six years or when you decided to become Division I. Show me something different, that's what I needed to know. I wasn't trying to force anyone to do anything differently. Just show me. And they showed me. They showed me their plan, and I showed them my plans, and I saw it's a fit."

 

 

 

Fatherly advice

 

There's more to it.

 

Tears were falling, his and theirs, when Gill announced he was resigning from the Nebraska coaching staff following the 2004 season in a news conference carried live throughout the state. He'd given almost half his life to the university. He'd been comfortable, content, wrapped nice and snug within the Cornhusker football cocoon.

 

And yet, at that very moment, a sense of liberation sluiced over him. He wasn't departing so much as inviting new horizons, walking through one door for the chance to knock on others. Life experience and the Bible were leading him by the hand, today's decisions molded by occurrences that trace to his early youth.

 

Gill was 8, a nascent athletic star, when his father, Turner Gill Sr., was partially paralyzed in a two-story fall. One side of his body went limp. He was hospitalized for a month, left to contemplate an uncertain future.

 

"Don't worry, son," the father said. "I'm going to walk again."

 

And he did, willed it to happen, remains to this day a kettle bubbling with enthusiasm despite some long-lingering physical limitations. That's one thing the boy learned from the dad. Don't ever short yourself. Never accept that you're stuck. Get up and walk.

 

But that wasn't the only thing Gill learned from his father. A standout athlete through his youth, Gill was a senior at Arlington Heights High School in Fort Worth, Texas, when the Chicago White Sox selected him in the second round of the 1980 major league draft. Sox owner Bill Veeck showed up himself, in a limo, offering the lad with a father on disability a lowball $70,000 to sign, dangling a small carrot in front of the financially hungry. Gill was tempted.

 

"I told him, "You do what you want,' " Turner Gill Sr. recalled by phone from Fort Worth. "But I thought it was too much pressure. He thought he should take the money to help us out. I said, "Well, son, don't do it for us because we'll make it. We took care of you this long, we'll make it. But if that's what you want to do, you do it for yourself.' "

 

That's another thing the boy took from the dad. Be true to your heart. The offer was dismissed, although Gill would revisit pro baseball at a later date, once his football playing career had ended.

 

It's interesting that the father, for all his sound philosophy, for all his keen insights, was at the time a man of lean religious faith. It seems there's a spiritual oasis on most every block in Fort Worth, the pursuit of greater meaning never more than five minutes away. And yet the father remained home while the mother, Hattie, led young Turner and his two sisters to Greater Strangers Rest Baptist Church and Full Gospel Choir every Sunday, sowing the seeds of religion that, for Turner, would fully blossom decades later, when he and former Nebraska teammate Todd Brown were reunited as members of the Canadian Football League's Montreal Concordes in 1985.

 

 

Bond with Osborne

 

Gill left Nebraska two years ago unsure where he was headed, what the future would hold. It was a decision rooted in trust, comparable to the one he made coming out of high school, when he took Osborne at his word and enrolled at Nebraska.

 

At that time, there'd never been an African-American to start at quarterback in the history of Cornhuskers football. Naturally, Gill feared he'd be rerouted to another position. Osborne assured him color would play no part in the competition, a promise he upheld and one that fueled a long and special relationship.

 

Gill moved into the starting role during his sophomore season, emerged as the unquestioned leader, became an extension of the calm, controlled, understated head coach he, like most Cornhuskers of that era, quickly came to admire.

 

"I would say of all the players who ever played for Tom Osborne, Turner has probably the most unique relationship," Brown said. "There's a special place in Tom's heart for Turner."

 

Gill learned a lot from Osborne, the coach who Brown said never once cussed, never raised his voice, never belittled a player, never pointed fingers at anyone but himself during Brown's five years at Nebraska. The manifestation of the parts of Osborne contained within Gill was irrefutably evident after the 1985 Orange Bowl.

 

A tie against Miami in those pre-overtime days would have given the national title to the Huskers, a team that also featured Heisman-winning running back Mike Rozier and standout receiver Irving Fryar. But who plays to tie? Nebraska scored a late touchdown, went for two. Gill's conversion pass for running back Jeff Smith was deflected away, the 31-30 defeat scrutinized throughout Nebraska in the obsessive detail that is the state's custom.

 

Maybe the Huskers shouldn't have gone for two.

 

Of course they should have, responded Gill.

 

Maybe Nebraska still warrants being No. 1 in the final poll.

 

Not so, said Gill, we were beaten fair and square.

 

Fair and square? What do you mean? Wasn't Smith interfered with on the decisive play?

 

There was no interference, Gill responded. Throw that ball 6 inches deeper and it's caught. You want to assign blame? Assign it to me.

 

That's the Turner Gill they all knew, his coaches, his teammates, a guy who'd lead his team to two touchdowns inside the final seven minutes then lament failing to do more.

 

"No one I ever played with came close to the confidence he had in the huddle and the composure he brought onto the field," Brown said.

 

"He would step up to the plate," Osborne said, "and he wouldn't make excuses."

 

"My dad always told me, "You're accountable for your actions,' " Gill said. "You don't have to put the blame on anyone else. And that's what I'm going to instill here, in this program."

 

 

 

"Leap of faith'

 

Sometimes in life you have to dismiss racial barriers, go for two, leave the job that has put you perfectly at ease because you just know there's something else out there, although you've no idea what it might be.

 

"I didn't know what I was going to do, to be honest with you, when I made that decision," Gill said. "I decided to take that leap of faith, to see where God wanted to lead me. I knew I had other purposes in my life, and I knew he had a vision for me."

 

Gill wasn't sure what to think when UB came calling, gauging his interest. It had been Manuel's idea to make contact after Gill's name was absent from the preliminary candidates list handed the AD. But this wasn't the way the game is typically played. Usually, Gill admitted, it's a connection between the school and the candidate, or an administrator and the coach, that sparks an interest. In this case there was nothing more than Manuel's knowledge of Gill's reputation.

 

Gill called around, consulted coaches who had been through the program, spoke with his closest friends, people such as Osborne, Todd Brown and Ron Brown, who coached with Gill at Nebraska and serves as director of the Nebraska chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and as an ESPN analyst. Gill needed help gathering his thoughts.

 

"I always knew he wanted to be a head coach," Osborne said. "You have to be realistic. There are only so many chances you're going to get. If you start turning down jobs you might find there are no more opportunities."

 

"From what I understand the administration in Buffalo wants to build a program around character and hard work," Todd Brown said. "The thing I know about Turner is he doesn't want to be a head coach just to be a head coach. He wants to be a head coach where he can make a difference beyond the football field."

 

But we're talking UB.

 

"He could have taken a job at Buffalo or at Ohio State, either way he's going to have the same attitude," Ron Brown said. "He'll go through some pressure this year, and we'll see the real Turner Gill. What you'll see is great character. He won't be pointing a finger, putting blame on somebody else. He'll take his hits and keep on going."

 

Gill thought back to something else his father once told him. You can spend forever looking for guarantees, or you can seize opportunities.

 

"I got it from a lot of angles, a lot of different people's perspective, and then said, "How does it fit for me? How do we move this program in the right direction?' " Gill said. "Because it's a journey. It's not something that's going to happen overnight. And I understand that.

 

"Now don't get me wrong," Gill continued. "I'm a very competitive person. And I understand W's and L's. We're not going to take those things lightly. But there's things that we have to do to get to those W's. You have to build a relationship with these guys. You have to get trust. And as we all know with those two factors, what has to happen? Time. Time. I can't sit here and tell you how long that is, whether it's one week or five months or one year or five years. None of us know that answer."

 

"In coaching my feeling is you always get somebody who knows football, who's a sound person, who isn't going to cut corners, abuse players or cheat," Osborne said. "Then stick with him."

 

 

Following his heart

 

The Turner Gill era commences next Thursday, when UB opens its season at home against Temple. Could this really be the way it was meant to be, with Mr. Nebraska Football, or at least the clone of Mr. Nebraska Football, taking over at woebegone UB? Does not this scenario require a pinch of the skin?

 

"I didn't come after the job," Gill said. "God touched them to call me. Then it goes from there."

 

Gill called his father when the deal was done, told his folks he was following his heart, answering his calling.

 

"Oh, boy, was he excited," said Turner Gill Sr. "Oooo, yeah. He was really overjoyed, just to get a start.

 

"I talked to him the other night, told him he's really in a good thing. He thinks he can do it. He's got a strong feeling he can turn this thing around. A real strong feeling."

 

e-mail: bdicesare@buffnews.com

[BIGREDFAN_in_OMAHA]

*****All Turner Gill articles whether directly associated with Nebraska or not stay in this forum. He is one of the greatest Huskers of all time. Why? Becasue I say so****

 

Admin Abuse! Admin Abuse!

 

Actually a very good article!

[coyeote]

WOW

[BigRedfxtoy]

I love Turner and have several Signed Pictures in my office but, Dammit where is the visine I can barely see after all that.

 

[HUSKER 37]

Bum p

[Blackshirtsguru]

If you watch Gill carefully while he is coaching on the sidelines, I swear it's another Tom Osborne out there. He always seems to be in control of his emotions. He gives a quick smile when a kid does something good, and when he screws up, Gill says something to him and that's that. I have been a Gill fan since the first time I went to Lincoln to watch him play. He has grown up to be one hell of a father, leader, coach, and mentor. Don't get me wrong, I think Bo was a coach that Nebraska desperately needed. I just hope one day down the road, Gill get's the chance to become the Head Coach at the place he grew up playing at.

[NUpolo8]

Turner Gill is a great man, but I will be supremely impressed when he is a Little Lebowski Urban Achiever

 

[gamecocks]

The thing that will stick with me forever about Turner, was after the MAC championship game, he was in tears over how his kids played. If that does show how much he cares for each and everyone of his players, then I don't know what will.

[HuskerfromIL]

Gill = Class