Coach Trent Miles has been a part of only two of Georgia State’s all-time losses. But when he said he put a couch in his office so that he can “Dr. Phil” his players, he laughs, but there’s truth behind that pain.
There is a culture of losing, built on 25 defeats in 35 games. Miles disagrees that there is a culture, saying nothing has been established because the program is so young.
But he has referenced that he has seen negative tendencies when things go wrong, such as a lack of effort from some players in Saturday’s 42-14 loss to Tennessee-Chattanooga. Based upon his experience at a previous school, Indiana State, Miles said he knows how to change — or establish, if you prefer — the culture and turn the Panthers into a winning team. It is a formula used by other coaches, including Paul Johnson at Navy and Jim Grobe at Wake Forest: Focus on what you can control, eliminate excuses and find leadership.
But it won’t be easy, and there’s no timetable. That couch may be gone next year, or it could be there a while.
“Our plan is great; our plan is proven; our plan will work,” he said. “But it won’t work in one week, two weeks, nine months. I can’t tell you when it will start working. Somehow that light clicks on when you get that signature win and you get the right people in place to get it done.”
The process has multiple parts. Miles equates it to a jigsaw puzzle. Once most of the pieces are put together, the picture is pretty.
Miles said he already has most of the pieces: The administration has the right people; he has the right people on his coaching staff; he has a high-quality practice facility and an NFL stadium for home games; and Georgia is one of the more fertile recruiting grounds in the country.
Now, he has to either develop the players he inherited into leaders and winners, or sign those types of players. Miles said one of the first questions his assistants ask high school coaches about their players is who is a team captain. Miles believes that signing players who are winners and leaders will speed the process of rebuilding pride. The list of commitments for the 2014 class is filled with players from winning programs in the state.
“It is a very difficult and patient process to change mentally when you haven’t had success the past few years,” he said. “That’s why we want to recruit strong-minded, tough, smart young men that can play, that love the game. They will keep their head up and fight.”
The losing can take a toll in many ways, including creating a feeling of numbness that takes away the competitive spirit and beats down players who want to lead. Miles is trying to guard against both, saying he spent most of the second half of last week’s game looking at the body language of his players. He wanted to see who still had pride in the product and who put their heads down.
Two players, both fifth-year seniors, quit the team Monday. One cited academics, and the other said he didn’t have the same passion for the sport as he once did.
“It’s like a relationship sometimes,” Miles said. “She hurts your heart, and at first you are upset. After a while, things keep going bad, and people get numb to it. If that’s the case, it doesn’t matter how hard you compete, you just get numb to it. We have to change you.”
Miles is looking for leaders to step up to keep that numbness at bay. Some players, such as senior wide receiver Albert Wilson, have visited the couch and asked Miles what they can do.
Leadership and winning were parts of the cure when Miles was at Indiana State. Both came as a result of a plan that Miles wouldn’t waver from.
“We went in there and installed being tough and running the football,” said offensive line coach Harold Etheridge, who joined Miles at Indiana State in 2010. “That’s something we haven’t done here yet. We are working toward that. It’s about players buying into what the coaches are saying and believing what the coaches are saying. Once it takes off, it will take care of itself.”
The Sycamores started 1-22, more evidence that when Miles said turning around Georgia State could take a while, he knows what he’s saying and has the patience to do it.
Georgia Tech’s Johnson said overcoming excuses was how he was able to turn around Navy’s program when he coached there.
“You have to get rid of all the excuses,” Johnson said. “Because at Navy what had happened was they had a bunch of built-in excuses on why they couldn’t win — because of the size requirements, because of the school, because of this, because of that. Sometimes you have to get rid of people. Because they have it built in.”
Once a team experiences success, players may not want to experience any of the losing they experienced before. Navy won at least eight games for Johnson after going 2-10 in his first season. The Sycamores added two more winning seasons after 2010.
Grobe experienced something similar at Wake Forest. He heard the school was too small, and the academics were too hard. He and his staff didn’t worry about those things because they couldn’t control them. He said players responded, resulting in 6-5 and 7-6 records in his first two seasons.
So when Miles comes bouncing into his weekly news conference, cracking jokes and trying to make people laugh, it’s not because he doesn’t care. Far from it, it’s because he believes in himself, he believes in his coaches, and he believes in his system. It worked once. He knows it will work again.
“I’ve been through this, I know how we are going,” he said. “There are going to be bright days ahead.”
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