By Mark Simon
D3sports.com
GLASSBORO, N.J. -- At Rowan University, success on the football field has bred more success, but with it plenty of resentment and bitterness.
The Profs, ranked No. 3 nationally with a 4-0 record this season, have garnered a national reputation as the team that everyone loves to hate.
"When you win," said Profs head coach K.C. Keeler, who has guided his team to the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl four of the last six seasons, but has yet to win a national championship, "everyone takes shots at you."
Gossip around the state of New Jersey and particularly on Internet bulletin boards is that the Profs run a program in which the standard of admission to the school is simply dependent on how well you play football.
Several players on the Profs have had their share of legal woes over the past few years. Those who ran into trouble are no longer with the team.
Rowan attracted a lot of attention last year when Notre Dame and Michigan State transfer (and New York Yankees farmhand) Gus Ornstein came to the university to play his senior season. He followed another Division I transfer, Greg Lister, who had tremendous success after stints at Maryland and Pittsburgh.
This season the Profs start four Division I transfers. Wide receiver Taman Bryant, who came over from nearby Rutgers, was the New Jersey Athletic Conference co-offensive player of the year in 1998. Two huge defensive linemen, Cornelius White and Tim Watson, both transferred from Maryland. Watson was second-team all-ACC with the Terrapins. There’s also linebacker Roedell Dupree, a transfer from Ohio State.
Keeler has refused to talk to the media this season about why these kids chose to leave their other schools, thus fueling even more speculation.
Instead, he points to the rest of his roster and the fact that 11 of the 13 seniors on last year’s roster will have a degree by Jan. 1, while the other two (Ornstein and Damon Troy) put off their studies to attend training camp with the St. Louis Rams.
"Transfers are such a small part of what we’re about," Keeler said, two days before his team thrashed archrival New Jersey 40-3 at John Page Field. "The (bad) situations have been few and dealt with severely. When you deal with 100 19- to 25-year olds, you have kids who make mistakes. It’s (more important) how you treat your program."
Make no mistake about it -- at Rowan, they take football very seriously. Keeler likes to think of it as the equivalent of being at Penn State.
Every Prof is required to sign a contract when he joins the team that outlines the team’s expected behavior both on the field and in the program. The beginning of that document reads "We are here to relentlessly pursue being the best Division III football program in the country."
Keeler equates his practices to those of an NCAA I-AA program. "The tempo is high-pace," he said. "No one is walking or standing around."
Division I teams have even borrowed elements of the Rowan offense, including a play known as the "Rocket Screen" that has worked wonders over the past few seasons. Southern Cal and Rice are among the teams that have borrowed Keeler’s playbook.
The program holds itself to the highest standards and with its talent level, there is no reason why it shouldn’t. Senior tailback Justin Wright, who went from fifth-string to superstar in less than a season, sparks the offense with Bryant and quarterback Jeff Orihel, a transfer from Division II C.W. Post.
Wright rushed for 240 yards in a 38-37 win against Division I-AA Albany, while Orihel and Bryant connected for the winning score in the dying seconds -- after the Profs had blown a 31-9 lead and had just given up the go-ahead score moments earlier. The first-team defense has stepped up too, having only allowed 10 points in the last two games.
"To live through that experience," Keeler said, "you realize it’s the best thing that could happen. Now we believe in each other. You don’t want to live through games like that because you’ll die young. Once you do it though, you realize the kids fought through adversity and now they won’t let teams come back."
It is evident Keeler feels that the Rowan way of doing things is the best way -- regardless of what others think. The results are there. The team is 90-21 in the '90s and this may be the Profs' best team yet. Keeler believes this freshman class, led by quarterback Mike Warker, is his best. High school players want to come and play for Rowan, but Keeler cautions those who don’t feel they can live up to the mission statement of the program.
"I have been known to scare kids away by telling them how demanding we are," Keeler said. "We are not for everyone."