Thursday, January 18, 2001
Tressel will have to win over OSU fans
The Associated Press
COLUMBUS — Ohio State has its new football coach, and some Buckeyes fans aren't sure if Youngstown State's Jim Tressel is the right man for the job.
“He's not what we need,” Clevelander Buck Holt said at the Varsity Club, a sports bar near campus. “There's enough gold and blue in Michigan. We don't need to be blue here in Ohio.”
Holt doesn't think Tressel has the qualifications to replace John Cooper, who was fired Jan.2. Tressel won four Division I-AA national championships at Youngstown State but has never run a top program until now.
“I prefer (the late) Woody Hayes,” Holt said with a laugh when asked about his first choice for coach. “That's the kind of guy we need. Woody whacked that guy, but he had discipline. He brought pride to Ohio State.”
Hayes was fired after striking a Clemson player during the 1978 Gator Bowl.
John Choppa, a Youngstown native who owns Rapallo's Italian restaurant in Columbus, said Tressel was the perfect choice because fans always take great pride in a winner.
Fans had been down on Cooper because his teams usually lost in big games. Cooper was 2-10-1 against rival Michigan and 3-8 in bowls.
“I don't want to say anything about Cooper, but it's a nice change. I think he's going to bring back the OSU tradition,” said Choppa, who has covered the walls of his restaurant with Youngstown State paraphernalia.
He said Youngstown will miss Tressel, and he even went as far to compare his departure to the fall of Youngstown's steel industry.
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Tressel will have to win over OSU fans