Lauren RabainoIt’s well known that some of the biggest deals of the year fall on the Friday after Thanksgiving. But for former Cal Poly head football coach Rich Ellerson, his deal came the Friday after Christmas.
So on the day after most families huddled around the Christmas tree to open presents, the United States Military Academy at West Point selected Ellerson to command the Black Knights football program, a move many of his associates and players at Cal Poly were not surprised by. That deal meant he would trade in his Cal Poly green and gold for the Army’s green and bold.
“If you know Ellerson, you know he took that job because it is a pinnacle job for him,” said former Cal Poly football defensive coordinator and linemen coach Payam Sadaat. “What (is) everyone else’s USC, Texas, Florida, or NFL gig, that’s his. I think that if it was a Pac-10 school, it would have been a harder decision for him. The fact that it was the United States Military Academy was a no-brainer.”
Originally a candidate for the Mustangs head coaching position, Saadat later chose to join Ellerson’s former coaching staff at West Point, along with four other Mustang assistant coaches when he was not chosen for the position.
For many on the team, Ellerson’s departure to Army became a matter of time once word got out that it was considering hiring Ellerson to replace Stan Brock at West Point.
“Once I heard that Army was interviewing him and knowing his background with Army, I knew he was going to leave,” said senior linebacker Carlton Gillespie.
The decision also seemed obvious to many because of Ellerson’s family ties to the academy.
Ellerson’s father and two brothers were commissioned officers at West Point, and his brother John was captain of the 1962 football team.
Ellerson was officially hired by Army on Dec. 26 to turn around the struggling team of cadets who have gone without a winning season since 1996.
A week prior, many players received a phone call from Ellerson informing them about his departure, a gesture that went a long way for some on the team. “That showed me that he still cared about us even though he’s going to another place. Because he wanted us to know before it leaked,” said junior wide receiver Mike Anderson.
Anderson mentioned that he hopes that new head coach Tim Walsh adopts the same recruiting system that was in place when Ellerson headed the team because “It gives a lot of the kids who play at this school the chance to play college football. Their size may not be DI-A size but they can still come here and play great DI-AA football.”
Gillespie said Ellerson’s departure was tough to handle, but that it showed a positive reflection of the team’s talent. No more was Ellerson’s coaching prowess and the team’s collective talent on display than in the Mustangs regular season finale against established Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-A) foe Wisconsin.
The Mustangs, seeking to become just the third team to ever defeat two FBS teams in the same year while playing at the Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA), never trailed until the final play of overtime in a 36-35 loss.
“I’m sure seeing how well we did against a Big Ten power house like Wisconsin helped in the Army’s decision to choose coach Ellerson,” Anderson said.
But many on the team said that focusing on that game would minuscule Ellerson’s accomplishments that bumped him up to coach at the FBS level. Ellerson left Cal Poly after eight years with a 56-34 school record, six consecutive winning seasons, including three Great West Footbal Conference championships, two trips to the FCS playoffs and a top three national ranking for the final seven weeks of the regular season.
“As far as success goes, he is one of the most successful coaches Cal Poly has ever had,” Gillespie said. “Getting us to playoffs twice since I have been here. I congratulate him on his new position and I hope he does well at Army. We all have accepted that he has left; we know things are going to change, but we’re going to work hard to continue the success of this program.”
No one knows what direction or how successful the team is going to be until Walsh has had time to formulate his coaching staff, implement his philosophy and watch them perform next season.
Walsh said at his introductory press conference on Friday that he plans to keep Cal Poly’s triple-option offense intact, but that he is not as committed to Ellerson’s flex defense.
Junior defensive tackle James Chen said he isn’t too concerned about the team’s possible new direction.
“This is our team,” Chen added. “We’re going to take it to the next level; we’re going to keep getting better. Regardless of who comes in, we’re going to stay strong as group. We’re not too worried about it.”