Thursday, May 14, 1998
Keeping his cool
the rule with
Bob Coolen
The Wahine coach leads Hawaii
By Dave Reardon
into the NCAA Region I
softball tourney.
Special to the Star-BulletinFor Bob Coolen, softball went from something of which he knew nothing to an obsession. Now it has settled in as a healthy passion. A missed bunt signal, umpire's bad call or screwed-up stadium don't get to him as much as before.
Coolen grew up in Brockton, Mass., playing baseball and swimming. He was vaguely aware of a game called softball when he was asked to coach it at a high school. Coolen later became head coach at Bentley College in Waltham, Mass., and got a master's degree from Boston University.
He came here in 1990, as an assistant for then-coach Rayla Allison.
"When I was a college pitcher at Wesleyan, she was my catcher in the off-season," Coolen said. "I had no idea she'd be calling me to coach in Hawaii."
He worked with Allison for two years and survived a nationwide search to become head coach when she left.
"I know it was hard for them to go back from a female coach to a male coach," he said.
One thing in Coolen's favor was that he was "localized."
"John (Nakamura) took me to eat oxtail soup and plate lunches," Coolen said. "He pretty much enlightened me to the culture. He made it a point to bring me into the community."
"You'll even hear a burst of pidgin sometimes," assistant coach Dee Wisneski said.
The seventh-year Hawaii head coach recently turned 40. With a wife (Nanci) and two young children (Demi and Bo), he doesn't put in the 20-hour days like before.
"I think he's grown a lot," said part-time assistant and full-time mentor Nakamura. "I guess partly because he's a parent now he thinks a little differently. He's more relaxed."
Wisneski played for Coolen for four years and has worked with him for three.
"There are lots of times when I expect that he's going to yell at the girls and he comes out calm and collected," she said.
Coolen might be cooler, but he's still dedicated enough to develop talent and put a winner on the field.
With the best all-around team in the program's 14-year history, Coolen led the Wahine to a 45-13 regular-season record and No. 10 national ranking. They are in Tucson, Ariz., for tomorrow's NCAA Region I opener against Pacific.
If by some fluke Hawaii hadn't been selected for an at-large bid, it wouldn't have killed Coolen, like it might have five years ago. Deeply wounded? Yes. Killed? No.
"Getting married and raising two children has put everything in perspective," Coolen said. "I look forward to going home. I was definitely a workaholic before. Now I make sure I spend time with my family. It's a nice mix."
As is the team. Six Wahine won Western Athletic Conference Player of the Week awards this season. Eight players batted .333 or higher. The team ERA is 1.44. The defense is solid, sometimes spectacular.
Unlike previous seasons when UH advanced to the postseason, no one player is indispensable. But even the last player on the bench would be missed by the others.
"Recruiting is tough," said Nanci Coolen, who played for Hawaii as Nanci Morelock in 1989-90 and was later an assistant for her future husband. "They come here and in 48 hours you have to figure out if they will fit in. The recruiting process is like adding someone to the family. He's let the assistants and the players have a lot more input. This is new. Recruiting used to be a 24-hour-a-day thing for him."
Nanci Coolen said she and her future husband didn't hit it off their first 48 hours together.
"It was definitely not an initial attraction thing. No way," she said. "I didn't think he was a jerk. But he was a whole different person, having come here from the East Coast and everything.
"When I became an assistant coach we started hanging out because we both liked to go to sporting events. We both liked going to the baseball games. One thing led to another and we started dating gradually."
Bob Coolen said it helps that Nanci is so closely tied to the program. She was someone he could talk to about his frustrations regarding the stadium snafu.
The new University of Hawaii Softball Stadium was going to give the Wahine a chance to join the sport's elite. To host regionals and have a better chance of winning them. To make some money.
But flawed sight lines and lack of accommodations for people with disabilities meant admission couldn't be charged this season. All the early-season publicity was about the stadium, not about a team that rolled to win after win.
"I don't think it bothered the girls that much," Wisneski said. "They knew they were a special team. And he (Coolen) did a good job of making sure they knew they were a special team despite the stadium."
Still, Coolen was upset. Despite a directive from athletic director Hugh Yoshida that a spokesperson from University Relations would handle all media inquiries, Coolen confirmed information for a reporter, not realizing he would be quoted in an article.
"We considered this not to be an athletic issue, but a university issue," Yoshida said. "Though he was correct in his comments, there was an understanding that there would be one voice on the matter. If I give a directive and someone doesn't follow it, I have to reprimand him."
Yoshida said he appreciates Coolen's "total dedication to the game of softball," and "we get along." Both say any problem is in the past.
Coolen knows that as coach for a non-revenue producing sport, he fights an uphill battle. He says other dynamics are at work, too.
"I think by the time end of spring comes around a lot of energy has been poured into the other sports," he said. "And by virtue of being the other side of baseball, sometimes we get lost in that shuffle. If we were pumped up as much as our counterpart across the street, maybe we'd gain a little more support and a bigger fan base. But that takes time."
Would a younger Coolen have snapped over the stadium situation?
"I probably would've been more of a maverick about the whole thing, but I don't think I would've been packing my bags," he said. "Actually, it might not have happened. I would have spent more time out there. I would have been checking everything, scrutinizing it, learning how to read blueprints. If I was younger and single I would have been out there, wanting to be more into it. Who knows? Maybe I would have caught something early and they would've been able to rectify it. Could we have had it (hosting)? Being a second seed, who knows?
"But you know what? The whole thing was a step in the right direction," he said. "We have something that not many other teams have. It's a presence when you walk out on that field. I know it will get corrected.
"I see the commitment there."
And Bob Coolen knows there are other things more important than a flawed million-dollar stadium.
There's his team -- one of the 10 best in America. There's the regionals -- UH's first in three years.
And most importantly, there's Nanci, Demi and Bo.
You see the commitment there.
Tomorrow
First round Hawaii vs. Pacific, 2 p.m.; Arizona vs. Niagara, 4:30
http://uhathletics.hawaii.edu
