Spirit of 76: FSU's Bowden Still in Charge

Longtime Coach Looks to Rebound From 5-Loss Year

Bobby Bowden wants nothing to do with retirement, and let him tell you why. When Bowden was a boy, his father retired from his job. He died six months later, and those were not a good six months. He lazed around the family home, bored and unoccupied. Bowden suspects he would have been happier back at work, and he learned a lesson from his father's final months.

"After you retire," Bowden said, "there's only one main event left."

And so Bowden, 76 and still in charge at Florida State, is left to compete against powerful forces he created. He has to compete against a legion of college football programs that tried for so long to catch the one he built, programs that finally have.

He has to compete against the growing number of Florida State fans who cry nepotism at him for hiring his son, Jeff, as offensive coordinator. And he has to compete against expectations that made last season, which concluded with a trip to a Bowl Championship Series game, a disappointment.

At Florida State, five outweighs $14 million. The latter figure is how much Florida State earned by playing Penn State and fellow septuagenarian Joe Paterno in the Orange Bowl. The former is how many times the Seminoles lost last season.

"From a coaching standpoint, no, that's not a successful year," Bowden said. "It's too many doggone losses. I wouldn't take [10-2] if you gave it to me. I'm still undefeated right now."

Said senior linebacker Buster Davis: "That's not a Florida State season. That's not the standard of Florida State. The standard of Florida State is to beat everybody, go to the national championship game, win it."

The pressure mounts on Bowden, and so does age, but neither has changed him. He started hitting recently from the ladies' tees. ("He calls them the forward tees," said Clemson Coach Tommy Bowden, who happens to be Bobby's son. "I've never heard him call them that before.")

He caves to his penchant for sweets more now than he used to.

"Other than that," Tommy said, "everything else about him is already out there."

Which is to say, the same man he's been since he took his first head coaching job in 1955 at South Georgia College. He earned $4,200 for the job, and worked as a lifeguard in the summer to make ends meet.

"And I had to coach basketball just to coach the football team," Bowden said.

During the five decades that followed, of course, Bowden made himself into a legend and Florida State into a proud football factory. Starting in 1987, Florida State finished ranked in the top five for 14 straight seasons. The Seminoles play on Bobby Bowden Field. He's won 359 college football games, more than any other coach.

Still, that success doesn't make questions go away; it only invites more. Like, what happens when FSU finishes outside the top five? The top 10? Top 20? What happens when it doesn't win a national championship in five years? What happens when the offense runs dry and the man running it is a legend's son?

People get restless. Though Jeff Bowden has been offensive coordinator for five seasons, he came under more fire than ever last season, as Florida State scored 15, 14 and 7 points in three consecutive losses.

"I feel like if he wasn't my son," Bowden said, "you probably wouldn't ever hear anything about it."

Bowden hears the sentiment rising, but he remains unaffected. Jeff is still offensive coordinator, because Bowden thinks his son is the best man for the job.

He seems like an old coach who has remained current, who hasn't lost touch with the sometimes brutal nature of the sport.

"Bowl games have become meaningless now, in regard to whether you win or lose, unless you're playing for the national championship," Bowden said. "Who cares? Who cares except the coaches and the players? If you don't win, you're nobody."

That is not a complaint. He says it without consternation, with levity. He says it as if he's happy to still have those challenges in his life at 77, which he'll turn in November.

He speaks like a man who understands the dark side of retirement, one who plans on avoiding as long as he can.

"The man, how old we talking about, about 87,000?" Davis said. "He's 76 years old. How many people know people that old? I mean, I know a lot of people who are 76 years old. That man has to be in the best possible shape and living condition of anybody.

"He doesn't have many worries. He's a multimillionaire, he's making millions every year. Coach Bowden, honestly, is going to coach until he feels like he's ready to leave the game. Right now, coach doesn't feel he's ready to leave the game."