Heater gives Owl fans the warm and fuzzies

Chuck Heater
Photo courtesy Univ. of Florida

Over the last four days, I expressed a couple of concerns about Steve Addazio's new staff.

One is hiring a grad assistant to coach the offensive line. The other is the possibility of rehiring Matt Rhule has offensive coordinator.

Justin Frye being hired as the new OL coach is bit concerning (I would have liked a proven line coach) and the possibility of Rhule being rehired gives me a major case Agata so I'm going to avoid that today.

Today is for the warm and fuzzies, which is about as good a day as any if you look at the temperature on the right side of this page. It was damn near zero yesterday and is trending upward today.

No name better than to supply the warmth than The (Chuck) Heater, Temple's new defensive coordinator, who is now officially listed in the Temple email directory.

Heater followed Urban Meyer to almost every stop along the Meyer road and Meyer gave him the ultimate compliment when he called Heater "Mother Teresa."

Mother Teresa as in Miracle Worker.


At age 57, (Heater has) served on coaching staffs that have won two SEC titles and two national titles at UF, a national title at Notre Dame, an undefeated season at Utah, a Rose Bowl and Pac 10 title at Washington, a Big Ten title at Ohio State, and an 11-1 record at Colorado.

He's a winner.

As one Georgia fan stated on his blog:

"As a recruiting coordinator for the Gators under Meyer, they built a recruiting machine with few peers. Also under Meyer and Heater, the Gators produced defensive back fields with devastating speed and toughness with kids who were coached well enough to begin contributing their freshmen year. He's a tough as nails coach with high expectations for his kids."

He will have those same high expectations at Temple. I smell shutout vs. Villanova (at least I hope so), a terrific kick-start to a wonderful season. I don't see being Temple DC as a step down for Heater because it will be his first sole DC gig (he shared the DC title with Teryl Austin last year at UF) and it will be at a school that has 16 returning starters from teams that went 9-3 and 8-4. If he creates a miracle at Temple, can 11-1 or 12-0 be out of the question?

I don't think so.

What would make the nation stand up and take notice of Heater, 11-1 at Colorado or 11-1 at Temple? There's plenty of kindling material here to light Heater's fire.

That gives me the warm and fuzzies today, on Jan. 25th, when warm and fuzzies are hard to come by.