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Another new era begins at Gaither

Former Tampa Bay Storm owner and new Cowboys coach Bob Gries makes his debut tonight.

By FRANK PASTOR

© St. Petersburg Times,
published August 31, 2001

TAMPA -- As Gaither's athletic director and assistant principal, Jim Pullin had hired hundreds of teachers, clerks, coaches and department heads.

He had named new football coaches before each of the previous two seasons.

But this hire left him flummoxed.

Neither outgoing coach Howie DeCristofaro nor former coach Mike Hobbie could come up with candidates for the job.

Furthermore, there seemed to be little interest in taking over a program that went 11-2 the previous season and lost four top players to graduation, including the county's all-time leading rusher.

After narrowing the field to four finalists, Pullin and principal Ken Adum agreed on Bob Gries, a businessman with a background in football and plenty of professional contacts but no previous head coaching experience.

And crossed their fingers.

"To tell you the truth, when we went into it this time, there was no clear favorite," Pullin said. "There was no person that Mike or Howie could recommend that was anxious or ready to step up to that. So it was basically an open call for candidates."

Gaither's experiment officially begins tonight as Gries, who coached in the spring jamboree and preseason classic, makes his regular-season debut against Tampa Bay Tech.

"It's amazing how time flies," said Gries, who was hired in April.

"You have 20 days in the spring and 20 days in the fall, and you've got to play a game now. One that's for real."

Gries is Gaither's fourth coach in four seasons. He follows Gary Hallauer, Hobbie and DeCristofaro.

Each had a different style.

Hobbie was an offensive genius with a knack for turning programs around. He revamped a Gaither team that went 2-8 in 1998 into a 7-5 conference champion the following season before leaving for Sarasota.

After leading Sarasota's swing from 0-10 in 1999 to 5-5 last season, Hobbie was named the offensive coordinator at South Florida.

DeCristofaro, a defensive-minded coach who emphasized weight training, built on Hobbie's success. He led Gaither to an 11-2 record and a district championship last season before replacing Joe Kinnan at Bradenton Manatee.

Gries, former owner of the Tampa Bay Storm, lacks the experience of the other two but compensates with unlimited energy.

"He's really brought a lot of energy, and that's going to be a good thing," Pullin said. "If the kids can grasp what he's providing in the way of offense and defense and begin to really play it with love rather than still try to figure out where they're going, then I think it will take off."

After losing tailback Lydell Ross, offensive lineman Cesar Paz, defensive lineman Kenny Huebner and defensive back Marcus Russell to graduation, Gries introduced new offenses and defenses to better fit his personnel.

He abandoned the Wing-T for the more balanced double-slot offense, which he used in high school. On defense, Gaither will switch from the read-and-react 4-3 to a more aggressive 3-4.

"Last year's offense was just Lydell right, Lydell left, and it worked pretty well," Gries said. "But Lydell comes along once in a career. We like to balance the running and the passing."

Gries made other changes as well.

Unlike many coaches, he limits scrimmaging in practice, preferring his players work on formations, speed and timing. He also took his team to Saint Leo during the summer for a couple of days of training and bonding, something no other county team has done.

Not everyone was happy with the changes.

Assistant coaches T.J. Payne, Anthony Jones, Max Ferrera and Bill Pelles resigned after the spring season, which concluded with a 14-6 loss to Riverview in the spring jamboree.

Pullin said he worried about the continuity of the program following the departures. Several seniors had played under the coaches their entire high school careers.

"Three of the coaches that were there were there for three of the years I was there," senior defensive tackle John Fitzgerald said. "I really understood them well. They knew who I was. They knew everyone on the team. They knew what they could do, and this year is more a complete start-over."

Gries said he planned to bring in his own coaches, anyway.

"They were all fine coaches and people," he said. "But on the whole, with no disrespect to any of them, they do not have anywhere near the level of experience that the coaches we have here today (do)."

Gries brought in his high school coach, Bob Spicer, to teach the new offense; former Buccaneers defensive tackle Tony Chickillo, who was the Arena Football League's oldest player this season at age 41; Allen Johnson, who coached running backs as a graduate assistant at Texas A&M-Commerce; and Chris Vlasic, a friend of Spicer's who also coached college football.

Despite the talent he assembled, Gries has less control over the situation at Gaither than he had with the Storm, which won two ArenaBowls under him.

"It's a little different in that, like in business, you like to use all of your different weapons," Gries said. "In arena football, it was easy because we could outscout them and do all that and find guys and find hidden gems. You can't do that in high school. You just don't have that advantage, so you've got to a little bit more play with the hand that is dealt you."

Gries' hand lacks speed, as he discovered in a 35-0 loss to Sarasota Riverview on Friday.

A preseason game, it "counts and doesn't count," Gries said.

"I'm not one of those guys that has moral victories like some guys who say we lost but we did good things," the coach said. "You went in the heat of battle, and if you lost, you lost. But that one didn't count."

Still, the loss was difficult for players used to winning the past two seasons. "It was kind of hard to take because we hadn't lost a game at home in two years," senior cornerback Kareem Garibaldi said. "But we hope to get another winning streak at home and take it from there."

Pullin is realistic about the team's chances.

"We graduated way too many of our starters, so we knew there was going to be a falloff," he said. "There's no 11-2 coming up. We knew that.

"So we're hoping we can be representative this year with all the inexperience on the field and next year start the cycle again."

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