| | By Gregg Doyel
Special to ESPN.com
Florida State's Bobby Bowden is going to quit coaching one day. He's going to quit, and when that day comes, there will arise a cheer throughout the rest of the ACC, a cheer of liberation from a tyrant who has won 62 of 64 league games -- as well as two national championships -- since 1992.
Only nobody knows when that day will come. Bowden gives no hints. He shows no signs of slowing. Not even his own ACC coaching brethren -- not even a son among those brethren -- have any idea when Bobby Bowden will retire as head coach at Florida State.
|  | | Bobby Bowden has 304 career victories and two national titles. |
"I don't have the first clue," says Clemson's Tommy Bowden. "The old man never says a word to me about it. I think he's going to outlast a lot of us, to be honest with you."
It wouldn't be the strangest thing in the world. Bobby Bowden built a dynasty out of a heap of rubble -- Florida State was 4-29 in the three seasons before he came to Tallahassee in 1976 -- and now has it on virtual autopilot. Recruits clamor to play for Florida State, not the other way around. Fans sell out 80,000-capacity Doak Campbell Stadium. The team contends for the national championship every year, and hasn't finished out of the top four since 1987.
Remind us again: Why, exactly, would Bowden retire?
"That's the question," says the old man himself. "Why would I leave? This is too much fun."
The fun starts anew Saturday in Jacksonville, Fla., when the Seminoles open defense of their 1999 national championship by playing Brigham Young -- led by another coaching Methuselah, LaVell Edwards, who turns 70 later this season and is calling it quits at the end of the season. Bowden's got Edwards by a year. He turns 71 in November, four days after taking his Seminoles into Clemson to play his son's Tigers. In fact, Bowden is older than any head coach in Division I-A besides Penn State's Joe Paterno, who turns 74 in December.
Unlike Paterno, whose career winning percentage has tapered off in recent years, Bowden grows ever stronger with every season. The countrified one-liners come just as fast. The enthusiasm bubbles just as much. And the victories mount at a record pace.
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All I know is I have the same desire now as I had last year, and as far as I can remember, the same as 10 years ago. ” |
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— FSU coach Bobby Bowden |
With 304 career wins, Bowden is fifth on the all-time list, 10 behind fourth-place Amos Alonzo Stagg. Bear Bryant's all-time record of 323 is in sight -- less than two years' work for an FSU program that has averaged 11 victories per season since 1987 -- but Paterno, with 317, is sure to get there first.
But how long will Paterno last? Long enough to hold off Bowden?
"All I know is I have the same desire now as I had last year, and as far as I can remember, the same as 10 years ago," Bowden says. "I still get nervous butterflies in my stomach getting ready for that first game. As far as fulfilling records, there's never been a record where I've said 'As soon as I reach that I'll retire.' Retiring has never crossed my mind."
Again, why retire? Recruiting begets winning which begets even better recruiting, and Bowden's staff has experience and continuity -- five assistants have been with him at least 15 years -- so the cycle of winning should continue for the foreseeable future. Bowden has the offseasons to devour World War II history, feeding a hunger that began as a teenager when a bout with the rheumatic fever kept him bedridden for almost two years, much of that time passed listening to radio accounts of the fighting.
"I basically listened," Bowden says, "to a play-by-play of the war."
Almost fifty-five years later, Bowden is running out of wars to fight. Along with that 62-2 ACC mark, Bowden is a combined 12-4-1 against his two in-state rivals, Miami coach Butch Davis and Florida's Steve Spurrier.
So he chases Paterno and the Bear, relentless in a pursuit that, of course, has to end some day.
Doesn't it?
Gregg Doyel covers the ACC for The Charlotte Observer.
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