Opening Statement on New Head Coach Doug Marrone:
“This is such a special, special day for us as we welcome back one of our own to Syracuse University as the head football coach. I want to start by thanking an advisory group that’s been with me and done such a wonderful job throughout the process. We did a very, very thorough search and we spent a lot of time. It was very important for us to do that so we could ensure Syracuse football was going to be in good hands. Syracuse Chancellor Nancy Cantor had an opportunity to spend some time with our head coach and she was thrilled about him.
“I do want to take this time to thank some people who were part of the group. Our chair of the Board of Trustees, John Chapple, who is out in Seattle, Trustee Howie Phanstiel, Trustee Bob Myron, former player Tim Green, who has been such a wonderful friend, Art Monk who is a Trustee of the University, former player Floyd Little, and none other than the great Coach Mac (Dick MacPherson). These gentlemen were superb. Their input was unbelievable, and it’s good to know that we as people at Syracuse can work together to come up with such a wonderful head coach.
“As I mentioned, the search was very thorough. There were some tremendous candidates out there. The pool of people was outstanding. We feel we got the best guy for Syracuse University. We have a guy who brings hope to the University, brings hope to our football program and brings hope to our students-athletes. I saw some of them today after he saw them and they were so fired up. We have a group of kids who are just so hungry to win and do the right thing.
“When you think of Doug Marrone, you think about someone who is a Syracuse alum. You think about someone who grew up here, who sweat here, who bled here, who played for Coach MacPherson here and that has a lot of cache here with us. You think about guys like Jim Boeheim who played here as well; John Desko, Gary Gait, that’s the kind of staff we have. All those guys have done wonderful jobs. We have national champions among those people. I know Doug Marrone is going to set the bar high to be representing the University in a way no one else could in the pool of candidates.
“We have a guy from the Bronx (New York). He has Northeast connections. He’s someone who has stayed tied to the high schools for years, even during his pro years. He’s done clinics with them and he’s stayed in touch with them. They gave me a huge endorsement because they know they want to send their kids to play for Doug Marrone. He brings incredible expertise from the NFL as the New Orleans Saints have one of the most prolific offenses you’ll see. You’ll see an exciting offense from him I guarantee you that. He was also an amazing college coach at Georgia Tech and Tennessee. He was considered a key recruiter on those staffs. Everyone looks at him as being one of the brilliant minds in the NFL and in college. He was on the short list for many NFL teams. We are so fortunate to take him away from that. I’ve heard that from a lot of general managers.
“I can’t find anything bad about this guy. I’ve talked to so many people who have said, ‘You have the right guy.’ It made whatever is not obvious to you, obvious to me and this group that Doug Marrone is going to be a terrific coach here at Syracuse.
“The last thing I want to say about him is that Doug Marrone is a ‘lifer.’ He bleeds Orange. He will be here to be the steward of this program. We will all be here to support him. You should all be proud of him.”
On how he knew Doug Marrone was ‘the one’:
“Doug’s very first interview was overwhelming. It was electric. He had all the expertise, the details, the recruiting plan, the winning plan. We knew we were going to have to see this guy again. I would say out of all our candidates, Doug was overwhelming. It was just so impressive.”
On the differences between Doug Marrone and Greg Robinson on day one:
“That’s a hard question to answer. They’re different people. Greg was a defensive guy, Doug is an offensive guy. Both of them have tremendous passion. Greg did a wonderful job of setting a foundation here, which I appreciate. This is a new day and age. Doug went to school here, he’s from the Bronx, he knows the Northeast Corridor and those are things which are very exciting for us. It’s going to help us with recruiting and winning football games.”
On the emotion of the day:
“It’s exciting because we worked so hard on this search. It’s time for us to let Doug take off, give him the support he needs and let him do his thing.”
On the process of finding Doug Marrone:
“It was just very thorough. We looked at so many people all across the country. We were aware of every candidate. There was no candidate that someone could bring up who I couldn’t find on my list. We were very methodical. We are only five days after the regular season ended. It’s not so much a comparison between Greg and Doug, as much as where we are when Greg started and when Doug is starting. Today is December 12; we didn’t even start a search last time until December 28.”
On the importance of getting this one right:
“You never have any guarantees on what’s right. The last situation was a tough situation. Greg did the best he could and I will always be appreciative for that. It’s not about being right, it’s about having people with passion and expertise. There are no guarantees here. Doug brings hope. The football players feel he is ready to go and show them how to have success.”
On the expectation on Doug Marrone:
“The expectation for him is to restore Syracuse football to being prominent again. He loves that challenge. He’s going to set the bar high for himself. I don’t really have to have an expectation. The nice thing about this is that we’re going to be able to become fans and sit back and watch him work. We’ll be there to support him, get him what he needs and hopefully we’ll get him a big fan base to come out and check it out.”
On whether it’s a concern that he’ll be learning to be a head coach on the job:
“It’s not a concern with me at all. When you’re talking about a guy who’s on the cusp of being hired in the NFL, they obviously see the same things we see. He’s a guy who’s a CEO, a leader, a guy who knows how to run an organization, who has put together one of the top offenses in the NFL. He has all the stuff. I don’t want to be shallow. I never said I was going to have a guy with head coaching experience. I said I wanted to bring someone in here who was going to be successful.”
On the kind of endorsements he received from NFL people not associated with Syracuse:
“Anybody in the league whom I talked to thought this guy was outstanding and was a homerun. Out of 126 calls plus, I haven’t had one person say, ‘You have to be careful.’ Everyone said we had the right guy.”
On not pursuing Skip Holtz:
“He was a wonderful candidate. I have great admiration for everything he’s done at East Carolina. We just had a pool of great people. A lot of times in these situations, you have a sprint to the finish. You identify who the great ones are and we had the great ones, and then you get to the sprint. It’s like a football game, a ‘who wants it more’ type of thing. There’s no question that Doug Marrone, with his passion and being a Syracuse alum, that he knew what he wanted to do and was ready to rock and roll. All the candidates were terrific though.”
On whether Doug Marrone sold himself or what they found out about his background sold him:
“I think it’s a combination of everything. You have to do a lot of checking. You look at numbers, you look at stats, you talk to head coaches. I talked to so many NFL coaches, general managers, college coaches, on and on and on. All the people had the same common denominator with Doug Marrone. We have a winner and a leader and he’s going to do a great job.”
On whether Turner Gill was in the running:
“Turner is outstanding. I was so impressed with Turner Gill. He is one of the great coaches in college football. He’s terrific and he knows it. I have a strong admiration for Turner.”
On how this search was different for him:
“I’ve done a lot of searches and some have worked and some haven’t. We’ve used the same system and we’re very thorough. At the end of the day, it’s all about finding that special, rare person with something that separates them from everyone else. This guy had those rare things about him. It’s the same things I saw in Pete Carroll. Certain people have certain things that become very obvious as you go along in the process and do your homework.”
On the importance of the search being so thorough:
“I think we owe it to ourselves. We just went through a tough time with football. We’re going to make sure. Last time we didn’t start the search until December 28 and this time, we had time. I feel like I’m at my best when I have time. At the end of the day, we knew when we got to the finals that we had a number of candidates who were good and Doug emerged.”
On the preparation Doug put into the process:
“This guy came in the first meeting with three or four notebooks with detailed stuff all about Syracuse. This guy has been preparing for this his entire career. It was so detailed. The recruiting piece is huge. His in-roads in recruiting are going to be amazing. That was a huge consideration. Then you take the offense he runs and what he does on defense. It’s very sophisticated. He won’t have enough time to interview all the people who want to be his assistant coaches.”
On the importance of having a guy with Orange pride:
“That wasn’t a criteria going into it. Looking back on it, it’s fabulous. Even if he hadn’t gone to Syracuse, we would’ve hired him. That’s how good he is. When you add all that to it as well, it makes it all the more special.”
On what makes this the perfect fit:
“We were so thorough and we had such great candidates, so for him to emerge you knew you had someone special. It was very obvious with Doug that he had some rare qualities. We’re not looking for miracles, but we’re looking for Syracuse football to be back. There’s a huge opportunity for it to be back and this is the guy to do it.”
On his expectations on how Doug Marrone will manage his time and responsibilities the next few weeks:
“That was part of his detailed plan. It was very detailed and thorough. He’s a relentless worker. He has a tremendous work ethic. You have to keep up with him. You can’t outwork Doug Marrone. I’m not even going to try. He’d sleep in the office. It’s his passion. He wants to make this place perfect and he won’t stop until he does.”