Virginia Tech couldn't ask for anyone better than Frank Beamer to guide its football program into the Atlantic Coast Conference.
When Beamer accepted the head football coaching job at his alma mater in 1987, his goal was for the Virginia Tech football program to reach a consistent level of excellence. The Hokies have come a long way since that day, and along the way, Beamer has become one of the most respected and successful coaches on the college football scene.
Beamer begins preparation for his 18th season at Virginia Tech and his 24th year as a collegiate head coach ranked fourth among active Division I-A coaches in victories with 167. His Tech teams have posted a 101-34 record over the past 11 seasons and appeared in bowl games each year during that span, a feat equaled by just six other schools. He guided the Hokies to three BIG EAST Conference championships and in 1999 helped direct Tech to the national championship game. Beamer's Hokies have earned the highest national rankings in the program's history, spending 57 weeks in the Top 10 of the Associated Press poll over the past five seasons. During one stretch that ended last season, Tech was ranked in 84 consecutive AP polls.
Winning has been just part of Frank Beamer's success story. He and his staff have earned a reputation for getting the most out of their players.
In 2000, Beamer and his staff directed Tech to an 11-1 record after opening the season with eight new starters on defense and an all new lineup in the kicking game. During the 2001 season, the Hokies posted an 8-4 record and appeared in the Top 20 every week despite having to fill four offensive line spots, the quarterback job vacated by sensational underclassman Michael Vick and the tailback spot left open when All-America running back Lee Suggs was lost for the season with an injury. In 2002, the Hokies were 10-4 despite attacking one of their toughest schedules ever with a young team that featured all-new starters at the defensive tackle, inside linebacker and rover positions, as well as major questions at quarterback and wide receiver.
A spot in the Nokia Sugar Bowl to play No. 1 Florida State for the national championship focused widespread attention on Virginia Tech and its football program following the 1999 season. And although the Hokies fell short in their bid for the national title, they proved that they belong among the top teams in the college ranks.
For his part in the Hokies' magical 1999 season, Beamer earned eight national coach of the year awards. He was named the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year, the GTE Coach of the Year, the Eddie Robinson Coach of the Year, the Paul 'Bear' Bryant Coach of the Year, The Associated Press Coach of the Year, the Walter Camp Football Foundation/Street & Smith's Coach of the Year, the Maxwell Football Club Coach of the Year and the Woody Hayes Coach of the Year. He also was named the BIG EAST Conference Coach of the Year for the third time.
There have been plenty of other accolades for the Hokies' coach. In a survey of Division I-A football coaches conducted by Bloomberg News in the fall of 2000, Beamer was named the best coach a school could hire to run its football program. When BIG EAST Conference football celebrated its first 10 years of existence in 2000, Beamer was voted the Coach of the Decade by the league's media.
In January 2001, the Tech coach was honored as the NCAA Coach of the Year by The Pigskin Club of Washington, D.C. In May of that year, an on-line newspaper named him the best coach currently in the college football ranks because of his ability to place Tech among the nation's elite year in and year out.
Following consecutive 10-2 seasons in 1995 and 1996, Beamer was voted BIG EAST Conference Coach of the Year by the league coaches. He was one of five finalists in the voting for the 1995 National Coach of the Year. In 1996, The Sporting News queried writers from around the country and asked them to rate the coaches in various conferences. In the BIG EAST, those writers rated Frank Beamer the best coach on game day, the best in game preparation, the best as a motivator, the best as a teacher, the best in big games and the best overall.
In 1999, The Sporting News ranked the nation's top coaches in terms of their ability to get the most out of their players. Beamer was picked No. 9 in Division I-A. Four of the last six years TSN has rated the Tech coach tops among BIG EAST head coaches. The publication has also ranked the Hokies' football coaching staff as the best in the conference four times during that span. Street & Smith's College Football 2002 rated Beamer as the top recruiter in the BIG EAST.
The rise of the Tech football program has made Beamer a man in demand. It has opened doors to places he may never have dreamed of as a youngster growing up in Southwest Virginia.
In September 2000, Beamer was invited to the White House where he joined a select group that stood in the Rose Garden behind then-President Bill Clinton as he made remarks on the Conservation and Reinvestment Act. Beamer was one of the keynote speakers at the American Football Coaches Association Convention in 2000, and in April, 2001, he joined former Prime Minister of Great Britain, Lady Margaret Thatcher, as one of the featured speakers at SUCCESS 2001, one of the nation's most popular business seminars. Last April, he was presented a Humanitarian Award by the National Conference for Community and Justice for his contributions to fostering justice, equity and community in the Roanoke Valley.
Beamer's success has also made him a much sought-after coach. In recent years, he has been pursued by numerous other schools and has drawn interest from professional football teams. But in the end, his loyalty has remained with the Hokies.
"Coach Beamer was really the only coach who was going to give me a shot at the college level, so everything that's happened to me, I have to give credit to him. I wasn't very big or highly recruited, but he saw something in me, so I owe him a lot. He's a coach who demands a lot, but also gives a lot and takes care of his players. If you need something or have a problem, he's going to do whatever he can to help you out, and as a player, you respect that."
- Jake Grove, Oakland Raiders
Beamer has always put Virginia Tech first - ever since he starred as a defensive back for the Hokies in his undergraduate days in the late 1960s, and surely throughout his 17 years as head coach of the Hokies. He has given the Tech program a sense of stability enjoyed by just a handful of other Division I-A schools. Only three other active Division I-A head coaches have been at their current school as long as Beamer.
In 1990, Beamer received a new contract and a substantial pay raise. He refused the raise, however, until such time that all classified and faculty employees of the university could have the same opportunity for pay raises. Most state salaries had been frozen at the time.
Another indication of Beamer's love for the university came on the night he was inducted into The Virginia Tech Sports Hall of Fame in 1997. He called it the biggest honor of his entire career. With the induction, he became the first active coach at the university to be honored in that fashion.
Beamer's overall record at Tech now stands at 125-74-2. He became Tech's winningest football coach during the 1997 campaign. Counting six years as head coach at Murray State prior to joining the Hokies, Beamer's overall 23-year record is 167-97-4. That record places him fourth among active Division I-A coaches in wins.
The 57-year-old Beamer, the first alumnus to guide the Hokies since the 1940s, took over the Tech reins from Bill Dooley in January 1987. He began work a few days after the Hokies had beaten North Carolina State in the Peach Bowl. It took a while for him to get the Hokies moving in the right direction because the football program was hit with NCAA sanctions at the time.
But everything came together in the 1990s. The Techmen finished 9-3 in 1993 after beating Indiana, 45-20, in a wild Independence Bowl game. Tech followed up with an 8-4 season in 1994, losing to Tennessee, 45-23, in the Gator Bowl.
The Tech teams in 1995 and 1996 were among the best in school history. The 1995 team swept the BIG EAST Conference championship outright and the 1996 club tied for the title with Syracuse and Miami.
The 1995 team was 9-2 during the regular season and then came up with a stirring 28-10 victory over Texas in the Sugar Bowl. The 1996 team went 10-1 during the regular season and lost to powerful Nebraska, 41-21, in the Orange Bowl after giving the Cornhuskers a fierce battle for three quarters.
The Hokies fell to 7-5 in 1997 and were beaten badly by North Carolina in the Gator Bowl, 42-3. But they came right back with a 9-3 mark in 1998 that included an impressive 38-7 victory over Alabama in the inaugural Music City Bowl in Nashville, Tenn.
The two winningest seasons in school history followed in 1999 and 2000 with the Hokies posting back-to-back 11-1 records. Tech registered its first-ever 11-0 regular-season record in '99 before losing its national championship battle with FSU.
In 2000, the Hokies' only blemish was a loss at Miami in the ninth game of the season. Both seasons, Tech climbed as high as No. 2 in The Associated Press poll, finishing No. 2 in '99 and No. 6 in 2000. The Hokies climbed as high as No. 5 in the 2001 AP poll and finished 18th. In 2002, Tech was ranked as high as No. 3 in the AP poll after posting consecutive wins over nationally ranked LSU (14th), Marshall (16th) and Texas A&M (19th). The Hokies' youthful team finished the season 18th.
Last season, the Hokies ended No. 2 Miami's 39-game regular-season winning streak with a 31-7 victory. The Canes were the highest-ranked opponent Tech had ever beaten on the gridiron. The Hokies climbed as high as No. 3 in the polls before falling victim to inconsistent play during the final month of the season. Still, Tech earned eight wins for the 10th time in the past 11 seasons.
Beamer's early Tech teams also registered many exciting victories. One of the most impressive came in 1990 when the Hokies capped the year with a 38-13 victory over arch-rival Virginia before a crowd of 54,157, which at the time was the largest ever to see a college football game in the Commonwealth of Virginia. During the 1989 season, Tech knocked off ninth-ranked West Virginia and star quarterback Major Harris, 12-10, in Morgantown.
During his undergraduate days at Tech, Beamer started three years as a cornerback and played on the Hokies' 1966 and 1968 Liberty Bowl teams. He received a B.S. in distributive education from Tech in 1969 and a master's in guidance from Radford in 1972. Then came the start of the Beamer coaching career.
He began as an assistant at Radford High School from 1969 through 1971. Then, after one season as a graduate assistant at the University of Maryland, he went to The Citadel where he worked five seasons under Bobby Ross and one year under Art Baker. His last two years at The Citadel, Beamer was the defensive coordinator.
In 1979, Beamer went to Murray State as the defensive coordinator under Mike Gottfried. He was named head coach at Murray State in 1981 and went on to compile a six-year record of 42 wins, 23 losses and two ties.
The Tech coach was born in Mt. Airy, N.C., and grew up in Hillsville, Va. At Hillsville High, he earned 11 varsity letters as a three-sport athlete in football, basketball and baseball.
Beamer is married to the former Cheryl Oakley of Richmond, Va. They have two children, Shane, a former member of his dad's football team at Tech and now an assistant at Mississippi State; and daughter Casey, a 2003 graduate of Virginia Tech.
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