USD Football 1996

REBORN ON THE B AYOU CON T INUED

ll 0 ID season swoon , tying So uth Car– olina a nd losing to Ke ntucky. At tJ1c time, you could hear me whi spe rs a mo ng some of th e older heads who had been around for half of the six losing seasons: "He re we go again." The real "magic" began with ~ closing victories over Ole Miss, 38- :,, 9, Arka nsas, 28-0, and Michigan ;: ~ Sta te, 45-26, in th e Inde pe n– H ow did it h a pp e n ? Sa id ~ DiNardo: "I just ke pt preaching 5 th a t th e win ove r Auburn was n ~ no t th e g reatest thin g in th e I world and me loss Lo Kentucky was ~ 0 no t th e worst. Kids kee p hear- ing tJ1ings that can get them too high and too low. Yo u 're always fighting this." The Tigers mis year have had to replace tJ1ree starters on offense and five o n defense, a departing group tJ1at included a first-round pi c k in th e NFL draft- wide receive r Eddie Ke nnison-and two second-rounders-defensive e nd Gabe No rthe rn and defen– sive back To ryJ ames. It was an indicatio n that Hallman did no t leave the cupboa rd bare fo r his successor. It was the fi rst ti me in 36 years LSU had three play– ers d rafted in me fi rst two rounds. With thi s year 's rec ruitin g class rated amo ng tJ1e top five in the natio n, DiNardo wo uldn 't mind keeping th e NFL happy. But before this year's cro p of freshmen put o n the Tigers pur– ple and gold , DiNardo already had some future high picks in his stable : sophomo re Fa ulk, a 5- 10, 192-poundjitterbug ofa ball carrier who rushed for 852 yards and six touchdowns last seaso n; sophomo re Ke ndall Cleve land , 6-1, 22 1, wh o rush ed for 562 yards and 10 to uchdowns; senio r ti ght en d David Lafle ur, 6-7, 278; soph omo re defe nsive tack– le Anthony McFad and, 6-1, 290; and senior linebacker Mike Calais, 6-1, 237, who had two bann er o )> z m ll ui de nce Bowl. Gl ll )> 1l I <

Now in his second season at LSU, DiNardo (far right) has his Tigers reaching high in the SEC West. a guy who grew up in Brooklyn and later became part of natio n– al-championship team s at Notre Dame as an All-America offensive g ua rd and a t Co lorad o as a n assistant coach. Whe n LSU j e ttisoned Curley Hallman afte r four years, DiNar– do became th e second-c ho ice se lectio n (afte r TCU's Pat Sulli– van backed away from a contract offer), and he hasn 't looked back. Within ho urs, he was off o n a whirlwind recruitin g to ur of Lo uisia na, la nding th e state's pr ize prospect, runnin g bac k Kevin Fa ulk , a nd a bushe l o f o the r blue-chippe rs. H e learn ed what he already knew: Recruiting for LSU, a state school with a rich tradi tio n, was not like recruiting for Vanderbilt. Li ste nin g to a 43-year-o ld DiNa rdo e mo te o n last yea r's tri als, you realize th a t wh at a coach does o n th e fi eld , from practice schedules to game plans, feeds less into the success of a football team tJ1an what he does be hind closed d oors, wh e n he and a player, for any of a number of reaso ns, go o ne-o n-o ne.

~o far, so goon, say famishen Tigers fans

! aoout the joo none :,, i

oy aguy who grew u~

z i ll 5 n

in Brooklyn.

Three times in three years is

:S 1l

I far below today's average, even for ~ Gl the student-a thle te who might ~ be A-plus on the fi eld and A-plus I < in class. "I find myself spending a lo t less tim e o n Xs a nd O s th a n Coach Parseghia n d id whe n I

lt might be tro uble at home, tro uble in me classroom, tro uble

o n campus. played for him," DiNardo said. In "A coach 's most vital Lask is DiNardo's case, he's delegating getting tJ1e pulse of his team," said more of th e Xs and Os Lo his Di ard o, "a nd it 's so mu c h assisLan ts in order to handle mose tougher today than it was whe n daily o ne-on-one problem-solv- I was in school. Why? Because of ing sessio ns with me people who mo re and mo re distractio ns." co unt, the players who make an In the three years Di Nardo X o r Olive o r die. pl ayed fo r Ara Parseghi a n at The best evidence mat DiNar- Notre Dame, he was called into do is succeeding in mis crucial task me office of me head coach m ree d id no t come in last year's early Limes. "I got chewed o ut twice," upset ofAuburn . It came later on, he said. when his team went into a mid-

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