Coaching at home, a dream for Leavitt

Jim Leavitt is living his dream in the town where he grew up, and he’s been doing it for… Jim Leavitt is living his dream in the town where he grew up, and he’s been doing it for eight years now.

He plans to live this dream out fully and never wake up.

What is his dream?

It’s a head coaching position for the football team at the University of South Florida — a team he built from scratch.

In October 1991, USF began discussions about adding a football program. Four years later, on Dec. 3, 1995, USF announced Leavitt as its head football coach, and it was all uphill from there.

Since that time, Leavitt’s teams have recorded six winning seasons in seven years, including a 9-2 record in 2001; the year USF beat Pitt at Heinz Field, 35-26.

The progress that USF has made under Leavitt is historic. He is one of the fastest active coaches to reach 50 wins, just behind Joe Paterno (Penn State), Lloyd Carr (Michigan) and Bob Stoops (Oklahoma).

He has taken a team from Division I-AA status to Division I-A. Last year was USF’s first year in Conference USA, where they posted a record of 5-3. This year will be their last in Conference USA, but again, it’s only uphill from here. Next year, USF will officially join the Big East, which is something that Leavitt is excited about.

“It’s a [Bowl Championship Series] conference,” Leavitt said. “The whole bowl picture is different.”

USF would like to grow into the caliber of program that several other Florida schools already are — such as Miami, Florida State and University of Florida.

“We’ve been trying to build this program,” Leavitt said.

And they are in a prime location to do so.

At a press conference Monday, Leavitt talked about how several Pitt Panthers from the Florida area, such as linebackers Clint Session and H.B. Blades, were all on his lookout list when he was recruiting.

“Unfortunately, we didn’t get them,” Leavitt said.

It’s only a matter of time before USF starts winning over more of the hometown recruits, who will make the major difference in his program — the program he worked so hard to build.

Before USF, Leavitt was the defensive coordinator for Kansas State. He helped take the Wildcats defense from the bottom of the rankings to the No. 1 spot in 1995.

His defensive success has found its way into USF’s program. The defense was ranked 17th overall in the nation in team defense last season under Leavitt But don’t let his defensive background fool you; he helps out on offense as well.

“I get involved in a bit of everything round here,” Leavitt said.

He runs a spread offense and gets several receivers involved in almost every game. His offense averaged 25.09 points per game last year, and his quarterbacks hit more than six different receivers in nine of 11 games. But Leavitt believes there is still room to improve.

“We’ve got to build, we got to better and we got to keep growing,” Leavitt said.

And his door for improvement opens Sept. 6, when Pitt travels to USF to play the Bulls in a nationally televised game — one of four nationally televised games they have scheduled so far this season.

With the national exposure and the great location for recruiting, USF will be an instant competitor for the Big East Title when they officially join next year.