FORT COLLINS — With a losing streak at an unlucky 13, the thought weighs heavily on Sonny Lubick’s mind.
Has the time come for the greatest football coach in Colorado State history to call it a career and walk away?
“That’s a tough one. I don’t think it’s any secret that everybody’s wondering what’s going to happen with me after this year. You just had the courage to ask,” Lubick said Saturday night, standing in the corner of the Rams’ locker room, surveying the aftermath of a messy 45-21 home loss to Air Force.
After winning 105 games since 1993, Lubick admitted he will give serious consideration to retiring at the conclusion of his 15th season with the Rams.
“You can tell, this stuff has crossed my mind,” Lubick told me. “I’m sure it will be evaluated with my family in the next three or four weeks.”
At age 70, Lubick insists he remains strong physically and engaged emotionally, despite a trying last 18 months that saw his son Marc, an assistant on the CSU football staff, fight a successful but worrisome battle against cancer.
“I don’t think I’ve lost the fire,” Lubick said. “But something’s gone.”
The results on the field have stunk. The Rams have not won a game since Oct. 7, 2006.
“It hurts so bad there’s no sense crying anymore,” Lubick said.
Then, he told a secret most football coaches would be too macho to reveal.
Lubick said he cried twice last week in front of his players, telling them they deserved better than being stuck in the cellar of the Mountain West Conference.
“I’ve been coaching for 40-some years, and I can’t remember anything like this. I do know they haven’t all been winning seasons. But this is the toughest thing I’ve been through in football,” Lubick said.
“I know somebody’s going to ask me, so I’ll tell you: I never saw this coming.”
With an experienced quarterback and workhorse running back Kyle Bell returning from a knee injury, Lubick genuinely believed the Rams had the right stuff to be contenders for a bowl bid. Almost everything that could go wrong, however, has gone worse than anyone at CSU possibly imagined.
“Being 0-6 stinks,” Rams defensive lineman Erik Sandie said. “It affects me every week. During practice, I think, ‘We haven’t won a game.’ It’s by far the worst feeling in the world.”
After a brutal September in which the Rams gave away a win to rival Colorado, played highly ranked California tough, then dropped consecutive road games to Houston and Texas Christian, it appears the players have lost faith in themselves.
“If you shoot 10 free throws and miss all 10 of them, then you’ve got to make that 11th one to send the game into overtime; you’re going to tighten up, you’re not going to be as confident,” Lubick said.
The coach’s contract runs through 2009, according to senior associate athletic director Gary Ozzello. Lubick cautioned a decision to retire would not be easy, because he feels a responsibility to his staff and the families that those salaries feed.
The field the Rams play on is named after Lubick, and the coach’s success has attracted millions of dollars in contributions to an athletic department that operates on a tight budget. He has earned the right to plan his own exit strategy.
If Air Force legend Fisher DeBerry could be pushed out the door by the Falcons after decades of distinguished service, however, nothing in a coach’s life is guaranteed.
“The boosters are going to be upset. They should be. I don’t blame them,” Lubick said. “You can’t live on your past.”
But fire him? Would the Rams dare to pink-slip Sonny, no matter how far the losing streak extended?
“I think that would be hard,” Lubick said. “But I would never want to bring a black mark on the university.
“Now, if they pushed you into a corner or something, I don’t know. When I left Montana State (in 1977) they wanted me to fire coaches and I wouldn’t do it. They told me if I fired three guys I could have my job, and I walked away from it.”
Every time Lubick extends a handshake, it’s as warm as an offer to buy a long-lost friend a beer. But there is now a trace of sadness in his eyes and hint of resignation in the coach’s voice.
“What was it Shakespeare said? The good a man does is interred with his bones and the bad lives,” Lubick said.
“For all the good we’ve done, maybe we should have left two years ago, and everybody would still be talking: ‘Sonny was a heck of a guy.’
“But that’s unimportant. Five years from now, who will care?”
Mark Kiszla: 303-954-1053 or mkiszla@denverpost.com
