FWAA honors Pat Harmon with Bert McGrane Award February 2003 Vol. 42, No. 1 Pat Harmon, long-time Cincinnati was a young sports writer in Illinois. Post sports editor and current historian Harmon began covering events at age for the National Football Foundation and 17 at the Freeport (Ill.) Journal Standard Inside this issue: the College Football Hall of Fame, has during the Depression era of the early won the 2004 Bert McGrane Award. 1930s. He would hitchhike to games, sleep on wrestling mats in gyms of teams New President Dick Harmon was selected as the winner 2 by a panel of previous McGrane Award he covered, and also break into the food- Weiss’ column winners. He will receive a plaque and lines of the teams. special recognition during a breakfast at But he will be forever remembered for LSU’s Nick Saban the College Football Hall of inaugurating the selec- named FWAA/Eddie 3 Fame in South Bend, Ind., tion of the Illinois all- Robinson Coach of the this coming August. state high school football Year The Bert McGrane Award, and basketball teams. which serves as the Football Harmon moved to the Grantland Rice Trophy Writers Association of Amer- Champaign (Ill.) News- goes to Southern 4 ica Hall of Fame, was estab- Gazette in 1934 when California lished in 1974. The award became a student at the honors an FWAA member University of Illinois. And Neil Parry of San Jose who has performed great he stayed in that central State wins FWAA 5 service to the organization Illinois town, married his Courage Award and the game of college foot- wife Anne, and built a ball. It is named after strong reputation before Garrett Holtz, son of McGrane, who was the ex- spending four years at Randy Holtz of the ecutive secretary of the or- the Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Rocky Mountain News, 7 ganization from the early Gazette from 1947-51. wins Volney Meece 1940s until 1973. Harmon went to Cin- Scholarship Harmon, a father of 11 Pat Harmon cinnati in 1951 and children, was president of the served as a sports editor FWAA Freshman 7 FWAA in 1984. He has had an illustrious and columnist for the Post for 34½ years. All-America Team career as a sports writer and editor and After retiring and traveling for a year, covered such greats as Vince Lombardi, Harmon settled in his current job as his- Previous winners of the 7 Pete Rose, Casey Stengel, Arnold torian in 1986. Bert McGrane Award Palmer, Eddie Robinson, John Wooden, Harmon’s name also will be placed on Bear Bryant, Jack Nicklaus, Woody a plaque in the rotunda of the College Call for entries: Best Hayes, Paul Brown and Joe Louis. Football Hall of Fame with the previous Writing Contest rules, 8 Harmon’s career started when he McGrane Award winners. procedures Page 2 THE FIFTH DOWN President Dick Weiss New York Daily News President’s column First Vice President NEW YORK — professionals who cover their teams. Alan Schmadtke The University of Orlando Sentinel We at the Football Writers Associa- Texas is the "War tion can never condone that. We hope Second Vice President and Peace'' of foot- CoSIDA and the APSE feel the same Dennis Dodd ball media guides, way. It's tough enough for writers to CBS SportsLine running 591 pages. make their ever increasingly early dead- Executive Director Most beat writers in lines without running through unneces- Steve Richardson the Big 12 suggest sary hoops. We're also sure most, if not Dallas Morning News you can avoid a her- all, coaches would not be too pleased by 2004 Directors nia if you just rip out this development when they make a Mark Anderson 100 pages near the home visit and have to sell their school Las Vegas Review & Journal front and another by handing a recruit software for a com- Jack Bogaczyk DICK 100 in the back. puter the prospect may not even own. Charleston Daily Mail WEISS Media attending We'd much rather buy into the idea of the Southeastern limiting media guides for football and Charles Durrenberger Conference two-day basketball to 300 pages and all nonreve- Arizona Daily Star preseason football kickoff in Birmingham nue sports to 75 pages and tone down Rob Daniels don't even try to lug home the heavy- the recruiting aspects in an effort to bring Greensboro News & Record weight guides they receive from 12 back some sanity. Chad Hartley schools. They simply call UPS and ship But the idea of doing away with me- Reno Gazette Journal them to the office. What's a $100 bill dia guides is totally ridiculous. when it comes to your health? ● Steve Henson We can joke about the size of these A word of praise here about the Los Angeles Times books all we want. But the valuable infor- FWAA sponsored Eddie Robinson Todd Jones mation SIDs work so hard to supply in Coach of the Year dinner the Fiesta Bowl Columbus Dispatch print is both helpful and necessary for us folks put on the week after the season at Rich Kaipust to do our jobs properly. the Phoenician in Scottsdale. John Omaha World-Herald At least, that's what I thought before Junker and Shawn Schoeffler, who have hearing that the ACC athletic directors always been good friends of this organi- Steve Kiggins voted 8-1 recently to do away with them Casper Star-Tribune zation, outdid themselves with this one. all together and are passing along the So did the three finalists — Nick Saban Malcolm Moran results to the NCAA Management Coun- of LSU, Paul Johnson of Navy and Gary USA Today cil, which may attempt to put an end to Patterson of TCU — who all handled the Joseph Person media guides all together in the future, interviews they did during the course of The State (S.C.) replacing them with CDs that can be the sold-out event with class and dignity. Michael Pointer downloaded into personal computers. Saban, the winner, took the time to Indianapolis Star I can only imagine a writer trying to do his homework about Robinson and look up pertinent facts on deadline in the his impact in both the state of Louisiana George Schroeder BCS championship game and an SID and the college football landscape and Daily Oklahoman handing him a CD. You'll have that infor- came across as a gracious winner. It's a Chip Scoggins mation in 30 minutes. shame he and his wife couldn't stick Minneapolis Star-Tribune It started out as an innocent sugges- around, but he had to fly out to meet with Jeff Shain tion from North Carolina Associate Ath- the Chicago Bears' organization about a Miami Herald letic Director for Communications Steve job he eventually turned down. Kirschner, one of the most respected Our association with The Eddie Rob- Bob Thomas people in his profession, to his AD Dick inson Coach of the Year Award has be- Florida Times-Union Baddour to consider limiting the size of come one of the best things we do to Keith Whitmire these books in effort to curtail what has help promote the best efforts in the sport. Dallas Morning News become an out of control arms race in I want to thank executive director Ex-officio recruiting. But that suggestion has taken Steve Richardson, for attending the Out- Chris Theisen on an unforeseen twist. This is just an- land Trophy dinner honoring Robert Gal- Big 12/BCS liaison other example of athletic administrators lery of Iowa for us and Wally Hall of the Jon Jackson worrying more about cost cutting than Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for leaving Duke/CoSIDA. taking a common sense approach to the this organization in such good shape. Page 3 THE FIFTH DOWN Saban named coach of year Louisiana State coach Nick Sa- Tigers’ only blemish was a 19-7 loss ban, whose Tigers claimed a share to Florida on Oct. 11. LSU defeated of the 2003 national championship, Georgia, 34-13, in the SEC title has been named the winner of the game to vault into the Sugar Bowl. 2003 FWAA/Eddie Robinson Coach This is LSU’s first 13-victory season. of the Year Award. With the victory, Saban was be- Saban, Texas Christian’s Gary lieved to become the highest paid Patterson and Navy’s Paul Johnson coach in college football at more attended the banquet, which is spon- than $2.3 million a season. In four sored by the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl seasons at LSU, Saban has com- and America West Airlines. piled a 39-13 overall record and won Other coaches considered for the two SEC titles. award were Southern California’s Saban became the 31st head Pete Carroll, Oklahoma’s Bob coach of the LSU Tigers in 2000 Stoops and Tulsa’s Steve Krag- following a five-year stint at Michi- thorpe. gan State. His first LSU team fin- Saban’s Tigers (13-1) won the ished 8-4 after beating Georgia Tech Southeastern Conference title and in the Peach Bowl. The following then defeated Oklahoma, 21-14, in season he took the Tigers to their the Nokia Sugar Bowl to claim the first SEC title since 1986 with a vic- Bowl Championship Series national tory over Tennessee in the SEC title championship. game. And in 2002, the Tigers FWAA president Dick Weiss Saban is a first time winner of the capped off another fine season by FWAA award and only the second playing Texas in the Cotton Bowl presents the Eddie Robinson LSU coach to win it.