Another good Harbaugh Article

Harry · December 6, 2006

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20...24harbaugh.html

Home-field edge: It's all in the family

Jim Harbaugh has three good reasons to coach USD football

By Kevin Acee

STAFF WRITER

March 24, 2004

JIM BAIRD / Union-Tribune

Gracie (foreground), one of Jim Harbaugh's three children, blows on a whistle she found in his office while son James draws under a diagrammed play as the USD football coach tries to talk strategy to assistant Matt Hohman (left).

Inside a crowded and creaking trailer, way too close to one wall of a tiny office is a desk untidy with papers. A few small steps toward the opposite wall, a conference table is surrounded by chairs and piled high with videotapes.

Every wall is covered by dry-erase boards filled with scribbled names, phone numbers and responsibilities.

On one particular dry-erase board this winter, in vivid color, was one of the main reasons Jim Harbaugh is the new head football coach at the University of San Diego.

In the top right corner was a bright orange sun. An island was clearly the focal piece in the center. An all-green palm tree rose from the brown ground. A blue sea surrounded the land, encompassing the entire lower half of the board.

The artist: 7-year-old James Harbaugh Jr., who did not see his dad's office more than a handful of times the two years he was an assistant coach with the Oakland Raiders. The drawing was made on one of the already dozens of visits the three Harbaugh kids have made to USD.

Jim Harbaugh wants to win. He wants to establish a legacy and develop the character of young men. He wants to work and has hardly taken a day off since getting the job in late December.

But he also wants his kids to have what he had.

"When I was a kid I would always go to practice," Harbaugh said recently as he sat inside his office overlooking Torero Stadium. "I was always around the players. In college football, (a coach's) kids can be around the campus. If I want to go to Jenny Craig and see a basketball game or go see Rich Hill and the baseball team, my kids can be around. Football and family is what is neat for me. That's what I've known."

Jim Harbaugh, born to a coach, was born to coach.

"It's his family and what his dad did," said Miah Harbaugh, Jim's wife. "It's in his blood. He lives football. He loves the game. He had to have some way to stay in."

Before he quarterbacked Michigan to the Rose Bowl and finished third in the 1986 Heisman Trophy voting, before he went to the Pro Bowl in 1995 and before he spent two seasons as quarterback of the Chargers in the waning stages of a 16-year NFL career, Harbaugh saw being a coach as the thing to be.

"It has always been my idea," he said, "that I would play for as long as I could, then I would coach, then I'll die."

Harbaugh, 40, made some $20 million playing in the NFL. He owns a home in Coronado. He is partner in an IndyCar team.

He could be spending his days on a golf course.

But, then, he couldn't.

JIM BAIRD / Union-Tribune

Jim Harbaugh carries daughter Gracie as wife Miah stands between sons Jay (right) and James above USD football field.

"I just think a man's got to work," Harbaugh said. "A man has got to be working at a profession . . . I was just like, 'Well, I know coaching is what I want to do.' I've seen the example of guys who took a year or two off and then they're miserable. I just said, 'Well, the day I'm done playing I'll go straight into getting a coaching job.' "

Jim's father, Jack, retired in February 2003 as the coach at Western Kentucky, shortly after leading the Hilltoppers to the Division I-AA national championship. Jack Harbaugh was a football coach for 41 years, spending most of Jim's youth as an assistant coach at Michigan but also with stints at Iowa, Stanford, Bowling Green and Morehead State. He was the head coach at Western Michigan from 1982 to '86 while Jim was playing at Michigan.

The father has seen his oldest son, John, become an NFL assistant, currently the Philadelphia Eagles' special-teams coordinator. Daughter Joani is married to Marquette University basketball coach Tom Crean.

Of his coaching sons, Harbaugh said, "I think I'm more proud of that than I am of anything that has transpired in my own career. When they were growing up, they must have seen something I was doing that they saw was worthwhile. That makes you so proud. They were around it. They saw things you were doing, that you were able to help some youngsters."

When Jim Harbaugh talks about coaching, what he enjoys about his new job and what he hopes to accomplish, it is easy to see back through the years.

He remembers feeling part of a larger family and that there was "nothing cooler" than when his dad would bring a player home for dinner. He remembers going to practice and finding a way into the gym to shoot hoops.

"They can have the college experience while they're young," he said of his own kids, who already have begun the exploration of USD. "I always had that. I could come to the football camps. I knew how to sneak into the gym and play basketball.

"I could go swimming, because I knew how to get into where the swimming pool was. There was a trampoline where I knew how to get to that. The whole campus was like my personal playground.

"My one son was up in the old gym shooting hoops. If I want to make them the ball boys they can be the ball boys. If they want to drive around in the little golf cart . . . "

Jim is also bringing the past to USD. Jack Harbaugh will help coach the Toreros as spring practice opens today. If the son has his way, the father someday will join the USD staff full time.

Jack already was out in January, counseling and observing.

"I never enjoyed four days more," Jack said. "He was putting his staff together, evaluating film. I got to sit back and just watch. I was so proud the way it was going."

Being an NFL assistant – working with the Oakland Raiders quarterbacks in 2002 and '03 – had its advantages. It was all football all the time, and Harbaugh briefly considered a rise through the NFL coaching ranks.

But that is not what he knows, not what he is comfortable with.

"This is more the way football should be," said Harbaugh, recalling how his dad seemed to enjoy his job most when he coached at the I-AA level. "It's an activity. It's important to the guys who play and coach. We want to be great. But it hasn't gone goofy. No. 1 is still graduating. It's about a great football experience, being a great person the campus can be proud of.

"It's not out of whack. Football is supposed to be an enhancement to your college experience. It's basically just leadership training at 3:30 on fall afternoons. It's not life or death. It's not anything else."

The Toreros do not offer scholarships in football. The players show up every day because they can't imagine not playing football.

"I see myself when I was 18, 19, 20," Harbaugh said. "They have the same dreams and aspirations. I went to Michigan. But it's really no different. I don't think what makes a great program is an indoor facility or a 100,000-seat stadium. It's getting to play and getting to be a part of it. Whether it be practice or games, your memories are built on being able to go out and do it.

"There is just so much to be gleaned about yourself from football. It's all the same if you're playing in the NFL, Michigan or here. These guys want to play as long as they can. They want to take advantage of it while they're here. I see my role as coach to make every experience a meaningful, fun one for them and make each person better.

"And in the grand scheme of things they call me back in 15 years and say, 'My football experience at USD was great. It made me a better man. I want my son to play there some day.' "

No one who knows him is surprised. During his NFL career, he would spend as much time as he could helping coach and recruit for his dad. He established a sports memorabilia auction to benefit the Western Kentucky program and would have Nike or FILA give the Hilltoppers shoes and uniforms instead of paying him for his endorsement.

"He doesn't talk about it," Jack Harbaugh said. "But without Jim's support, they wouldn't be playing football at Western Kentucky."

Now he is the man in charge, doing what he used to watch and hear about his dad doing.

His eyes alight as he speaks of going into recruit Deene Kabiling's home earlier this year, trying to get him to play at USD. Kabiling, who committed to USD, confirmed the events of Harbaugh's visit to his home.

The story illustrated the other reason Harbaugh is at USD.

"It was one of 10 best meals I had in my life," Harbaugh said. "The whole family is there. The little 6-year-old is jumping up in my lap. At the end of the night we were singing karaoke. We had a ball.

"I saw it with my dad. You become a part of the family. You have a family that is giving you their 18-year-old son, and you're like in charge of him. They want to know he is going to a place he'll be looked after and disciplined and pushed. It's a big responsibility. It's an incredible relationship you're making there."