Texas A&M
Battalion Sports
Thursday, April 7, 1983/The Battalion/Page 11
The Aggies’ Jackie Sherrill says he’s learned from
his first year as athletic director of Texas A&M,
and that he has high hopes for the future of the
athletic program. Sherrill and the Aggies are cur
rently in the middle of spring football practice.
Sherrill reflects on first year
• • •
by John P. Lopez
Battalion Staff
A little over a year ago, Jackie
Sherrill was hired as athletic di
rector and head football coach at
Texas A&M. And with Sherrill’s
hiring came immense attention
from the media, fans, coaches,
football critics and just about
everyone else associated with
college sports.
In his first year at Texas
A&M, Sherrill’s every move was
scrutinized. And by some, Sher
rill’s every move was criticized.
But despite a sub-par 5-6 foot
ball season, despite the atten
tion, despite being questioned
constantly about rumors of
changes in the athletic depart
ment staff and despite the critic
ism, Sherrill says his first year at
Texas A&M was anything but
unsuccessful.
“You try to look at all facets
and make some judgments,”
Sherrill said. “Last year our soft-
ball team won the national
championship, the golf team
was in the top ten and won the
Southwest Conference title, our
basketball team went to the NIT
and our baseball team went to
the playoffs. So as a total prog
ram, these are the things you
need to look at when you try to
make a judgment.”
But what about the football
record? Football is what most
Aggies take pride in. It brings in
money and, more important,
prestige to the school. Prior to
taking over at Texas A&M,
Sherrill enjoyed immense suc
cess at the University of Pitt
sburgh. And many Aggie sup
porters were counting on the
same success to show itself at
Texas A&M immediately — it
didn’t. But Sherrill said he’s still
as confident as ever as Aggie
head coach.
“The worst thing that could
’ve happened was for us to have
instant success,” he said. “And
then we could have plummetted
the next year. When we get
there by working hard, people
will appreciate it a lot more.”
Sherrill added that naturally
he would’ve liked to start out a
winner, but he said there was
never a point during the football
season when he lost his confi
dence.
“Once you start blaming
yourself, then you’ve got prob
lems,” he said. “There are just
some things you can’t control.
What I’m looking for is to do a
good job on the things I can con
trol. The (media) pressure goes
with the territory, I don’t have
any trouble with it. It’s kind of
like being a quarterback — the
pressure is there.”
One thing Sherrill and his
staff couldn’t control during his
first football season was the
number of injuries that seemed
to infest the Aggie dressing
room. Running backs Thomas
Sanders, Johnny Hector and
Earnest Jackson, quarterback
Gary Kubiak and tight end
Mark Lewis all missed at least
one game because of injuries.
“I don’t think anybody has
enough depth to make up for
losses like that,” Sherrill said.
“Naturally I thought we’d be a
little more explosive, but we lost
a lot of key players and that took
away a big part of the team. It’s
kind of like making it to the Indy
500 and all of a sudden one of
your pistons is gone. You just
can’t perform as well as you had
hoped.”
Another factor which might
have contributed to the dis-
sapointing year, Sherrill said,
was the offensive philosophy. In
retrospect, Sherrill said he
might have changed some
things on offense if he could.
“We probably wouldn’t have
been as reckless as we were
offensively,” he said. “We put an
awful lot of pressure on our de
fense. If things were a little dif
ferent, then the defense
wouldn’t have had such a big
burden put on them.
“And I think defensively we
were too concerned about the
See SHERRILL page
12
And discusses the Aggies’ future
by John P. Lopez
Battalion Staff
The year is 1993.
Jackie Sherrill has been head
football coach and athletic dire
ctor at Texas A&M for 11 years.
The Aggie football team hasjust
won its fifth Southwest Confer
ence championship in the last
eight years and is being honored
at the University special events
center.
The 17,000 screaming Aggie
fans stand up out of their
cushion-backed seats to do a yell
for the team.
Over at the ultra-modern
track facility, the Texas A&M
track team is winding up prac
tice while the swim team is pre
paring the swimming facility,
which is considered by many to
be the best anywhere, for a na
tional invitational meet.
Sound a little far-fetched? -
Maybe. But the above men
tioned situation is certainly the
direction that Sherrill would like
the Texas A&M athletic depart
ment to be headed.
Sherrill said: “My biggest
goal is to be set facility-wise and
to win in everything.”
Simply said, but Sherrill
knows that multi-purpose are
nas and undefeated records
don’t come about through the
power of positive thinking.
“We want to be competitive,
we want to have the opportunity
to win the conference title and
have the opportunity to vie for
the national championship — all
the things that I’ve been able to
do in the past,” he said. “We’re
not going to be there every year,
but hopefully we’ll be consistent
ly competitive.
“I think we’re going in the
right direction academically and
in athletics.”
Academically? No typo. Sher
rill said he is genuinely con
cerned about how his athletes
push pencils and practice
dummys.
“The biggest thing we’ve
accomplished so far is getting
the academic people involved,”
Sherrill said. “The administra
tion is very supportive of us.
And it’s helped. I think acade
mically we’ve made an awful lot
of progress. The credibility of
our athletes has risen tremen
dously. Our freshmen had a
g.p.r. this year of 2.6 and that’s
quite an accomplishment when
you consider that the student
body’s is somewhere around 2.3.
It all fits into place when you’re
trying to build a program.”
The main building block in
molding a successful all around
athletic department, naturally,
is to have top-notch athletes. But
great athletes usually don’t
attend schools where the facili
ties don’t fit their needs. Sherrill
said Texas A&M is well on its
way to having the facilities it
needs.
“I think there are a couple of
facilities that we really need,” he
said. “We need a place for our
basketball team to play, we need
a track and we need a place for
our swimming.
“And those facilities are for
our other students too. Our stu
dents have a large interest in
physical fitness and they need a
place to go. Our student body
deserves a place where they can
enjoy special events. They
shouldn’t have to stand in line
for two days for tickets. And
they deserve a place where they
can go to graduate.”
Although still in the planning
stages, Sherrill was confident ab
out the locations and time the
new facilities will pop up on the
Texas A&M campus.
“I don’t think we’re that far
away,” he said. “You have to go
in stages, but I don’t think we’re
too far away from having the
facilities we need. Right now, the
plan is to have it (special events
center) right across fronuthe in
tramural fields and the track is
.3
set aside for the area behind the
baseball field. There are several
possible ways they can be built
and I think we’re getting closer
to that point.”
Another reason Sherrill
would like to see first-class facili
ties on the Texas A&M campus
is for the Aggie fans, he said.
“I think a lot of schools have
support, but they don’t have the
support of the A&M student
body,” Sherrill said. “When you
win, naturally you’re going to
have support, but the support
here goes a lot deeper than just
winning.”
Sherrill added that he’s en
joyed the association he has had
this year with the student body
which is one reason he formed
the 12th Man Kickoff team — to
strengthen the relationship be
tween the student body and the
student-athletes.
“I’m very excited about the
See FUTURE page 12
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