Coaching Alouettes ‘truly is a gift,’ Higgins says
Surprise choice to lead team hopes to last longer than last season’s Hawkins
Hens love roosters, geese love ganders, everyone else loves Ned Flanders.
— song from The Simpsons
Tom Higgins, who turns 60 next month, doesn’t look like the type who normally watches cartoons. So the first time he saw his name used in reference to the fictional character on the animated television series — Ned Flanders being among the friendliest and most compassionate people ever — Higgins wasn’t sure how to react.
He turned to his children and even they were uncertain, so Higgins watched an episode. That was more than a decade ago. And the nickname, used occasionally in print, has stuck with him.
“I think it’s meant as a compliment. I take it as such. He’s a goody two-shoes. I don’t know if I go that far. But I understand some of the characteristics and it makes sense,” Higgins, the Alouettes’ new head coach, admitted during a lengthy interview this week following a practice.
“I do know he’s happy-golucky. That’s me. He doesn’t use profanity. That’s me. I think he has more hair than I do — but I’m better conditioned than him.”
When the Als appointed Higgins their head coach last February — a name that surfaced suddenly and wasn’t on anyone’s radar — many jaws through the Canadian Football League dropped in astonishment. It’s not that Higgins isn’t qualified to coach. He’s been the head coach at Edmonton and Calgary, was the Eskimos’ general manager, is a two-time CFL coach of the year and has both won and lost a Grey Cup game.
It’s just Higgins hasn’t coached in six years, having been the CFL’s director of officiating since 2008. When the league didn’t invite him back, Higgins said he hoped to return to coaching but admitted, given the timing, that possibility appeared remote this season. He interviewed with the expansion Ottawa Redblacks, but organizations weren’t exactly queued for his services.
So you can understand Higgins’s astonishment when the phone rang late one night, Als owner Robert Wetenhall on the other end, calling from his Palm Beach, Fla., resort hotel, asking him if he wanted to coach Montreal.
“I thought he was kidding. I think he knew the answer,” Higgins said.
It was one of those surreal moments Higgins said he’ll never forget. He was in his kitchen, at least 8 or 9 p.m. Calgary time, and his heart started to race — if only a bit. Higgins figured, even if he didn’t get the job, he nonetheless would be flattered for the consideration.
“He made my year,” Higgins said.
One day later, Wetenhall’s son, Andrew, one of the team’s governors, called, offering a contract. It was done that quickly. No interview. No trip to Florida in the dead of winter, or New York for that matter. The Wetenhall family had decided GM Jim Popp wouldn’t remain the Als’ head coach. They wanted him returning to what he does best, finding personnel. They decided Higgins was their man.
“It’s a gift. It truly is a gift,” Higgins said.“I didn’t think I’d have a 32nd year in the CFL — this year. I didn’t know there was anything that was open. Now, I look upon the blessing that it was the CFL which chose to make a change. It was their prerogative. Everyone has an expiration date.”
Higgins can only hope he lasts longer than five games. Dan Hawkins, remember him? The Als were 2-3 when he was fired, on the bye week in their schedule and coming off a victory against Edmonton. And they still had an active Anthony Calvillo at quarterback.
Higgins is well aware of the history and has joked, more than once, he just wants to last longer than the last guy. We imagine he hopes it’s considerably longer.
In his short time with the organization, comparisons have already been made between Higgins and Marc Trestman, now the head coach of the Chicago Bears.
Trestman had a successful five-year run in Montreal, complete with two Cups and three championship-game appearances. But Trestman hadn’t been away from coaching as long as Higgins. And Trestman cut his teeth as a successful offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in the NFL.
Higgins, like Trestman, has talked about creating an environment. Higgins, like Trestman, has talked about the journey, about treating people with respect, about teaching players life lessons.
When the Als conclude meetings and film review, he expects the players — not the equipment staff — to clean up the room at Olympic Stadium. When they flew to Calgary on Friday for Saturday afternoon’s regular-season opener against the Stampeders, the players were expected to wear business attire. Jackets with an open collar. If no jacket, a tie was required.
“So far, he’s a great mentor,” receiver Eric Deslauriers said. “I really think he’s got the team back on track as far as being organized and structured. I think he has us back on track, and that’s a lot to say, considering how last year went.
“If you google his name, you’ll see his track record. When you look at someone’s credentials and see that kind of stuff, it speaks for itself.”
So, what exactly have the Als inherited here and how will it play out? That, of course, remains to be determined. With no franchise quarterback at his disposal any longer, Higgins almost certainly has bought himself a period of grace.
Other than naming himself special teams coordinator, Higgins will do more delegating than coaching, leaving those aspects to his assistants. And there’s not necessarily anything wrong with that scenario.
The Als have acquired a coach who doesn’t drink — alcohol or carbonated beverages — hasn’t lost his temper yet and has used no profanity on the practice field. Coincidentally, Higgins’s grandfather was an Irish cop. And an alcoholic, he admitted.
“I tried a sip of beer in university. It tasted crappy,” Higgins said. “Someone told me I had to acquire a taste for it. No thanks.
“I’m representing the Higgins name, something that’s much greater. The Als are a long-standing tradition. I’m representing the family and the league. I share that with the athletes, teasing them about being conscious about using profanity. Who’s it impressing? It shows you have a small vocabulary. There’s no reason to lose self control.
“You can’t preach those things if that’s not what you are,” Higgins said.
Higgins is a devout family man who speaks about his wife, Sharon, in reverential tones. The two raised three well-adjusted and grounded children, now adults. Indeed, Higgins will be celebrating his 34th wedding anniversary on Saturday and will be seeing his wife for the first time in five weeks.
They met in 1976 and were married four years later. She was the receptionist at the dormitory in which Stampeder players were staying. Higgins, a linebacker, would have a five-year career with Calgary, the Buffalo Bills and Saskatchewan.
Love at first sight? “She would say yes,” Higgins quipped. “I would say, she would say, it took a while to figure out that was the right move for myself.”
Born in upstate New Jersey, Higgins was raised in a football environment and followed his father’s footsteps. Tom Higgins Sr. was drafted by the Chicago Cardinals and also played for Philadelphia before becoming a legendary coach at Piscataway High School.
The Als’ head coach, meanwhile, was a trumpet player in his youth along with an all-around multi-sport athlete, an all-American amateur wrestler at North Carolina State.
Higgins has a teaching certificate, having taught vocational and indus- trial education, a co-op program. He worked on a master’s degree in adaptive physical education, figuring a guy who wants to coach had better teach gym class. To this day, he remains qualified to teach high school math and science.
Higgins is a voracious reader — John Grisham and Jeffrey Archer among his favourite authors—loves to travel, enjoys live theatre and fancies himself quite the carpenter, enjoying the solitude of woodworking. Indeed, many of the shelves in his Calgary home are hand made.
He’s also a coach who went 7-10-1 in his final season with the Stampeders — Calgary lost starting quarterback Henry Burris to injury — fired his defensive coordinator, Denny Creehan, in midseason and also, reportedly, lost the confidence of his veteran players. His teams lost the division semifinal each of his last three seasons.
The Als, meanwhile, were barely more than a week into training camp when Higgins fired Rick Worman, his offensive coordinator.
“It didn’t matter what I did, I was getting fired (in 2007),” Higgins said. “Creehan? That’s not exactly what happened. And I truly believe the dressing room wasn’t lost. It’s easy for players to say anything after the fact. There are two stories, and somewhere in between is the truth.”
Worman, a friend of Higgins, was one of only two hirings he made this season, the remainder of his staff having been inherited from Popp, who expected to return as coach.
“I couldn’t get it back on track after I found out all the information,” Higgins said. “There was only one decision to be made. I still feel sick about it. There’s a good football coach in there. I couldn’t pull it out. I failed him.”
Higgins believes coaching is like riding a bicycle; that this is what he knows and is best suited for. He coached officials for six years, and now he’s coaching his coaches. He believes a coach who returns after taking a step back, returns better and enriched.
Predictably, he looks at the Als’ situation with a glass half-full mentality. “At some point, the Hall of Fame quarterback was going to leave,” he said, shrugging.
“It’s not as bad as people think. It’s a fresh opportunity. There’s talent here.”
Higgins, who lives in a condo near Molson Stadium, took the métro home the other night and was flattered to be recognized. It made him realize he has become one of the franchise’s faces. He stopped and talked. Of course he did.
“I look at each day as a gift. We’re not guaranteed anything,” he said. “If you get up, it’s a good day. It’s a choice to be positive. Tom Higgins is blessed. So is his family.
“No matter what happens — if we’re here five years, 10 years or five weeks — I hope to have an impact on anybody that I come across. I want to have an opportunity to impact them.”