Cooper has Badgers looking South for players to come North
05/27/02
The University of Wisconsin never spent much time recruiting football players in Alabama, Georgia or Mississippi.
Until now.
''I'm trying to talk a few Southern boys into a change of scenery,'' says Ron Cooper, a Southern boy himself. ''I tell 'em, 'Come on up and take a look. You might be surprised.' ''
Cooper, the football coach at Alabama A&M for the past four years, left The Hill in January to become Barry Alvarez's secondary coach at Wisconsin. He has been in and out of Huntsville the past week, visiting family and checking on various prospects in a 200-mile radius.
''I've pretty much got the South as my recruiting area,'' Cooper said. ''I've got Houston and Dallas, Atlanta, all parts of Alabama and Georgia. We've found that kids nowadays, especially in the inner cities, are willing to travel and go all over. I'm hoping some of them will become Badgers.''
Cooper, a graduate of Lee High School and Jacksonville State, has been coaching football since 1984, when he was a graduate assistant at Minnesota. Two members of the current Wisconsin staff, quarterbacks coach Jeff Horton and offensive line coach Jim Hueber, were coaching with the Golden Gophers at the same time.
Another Wisconsin coach, defensive coordinator John Palermo, once coached with Cooper at Appalachian State.
Cooper, who has been a head coach at Eastern Michigan, Louisville and A&M over the past nine years, is back in the assistant coaching ranks for the first time since he worked for Lou Holtz at Notre Dame in 1991-92.
''I'm enjoying the experience of being back in the Big Ten,'' Cooper said. ''I was 22 years old when I was at Minnesota as a graduate assistant. The Big Ten is big time. When you're away from Division I for a while, you sort of forget all the advantages. This opportunity got my juices flowing again.''
That's not to say he regrets his time at Alabama A&M, where he took over a program moving up from Division II to Division I-AA. The Bulldogs were 22-23 under Cooper.
''I had hoped to come here and maybe change some attitudes and do things the right way and make a big impact right away in the SWAC,'' Cooper said. ''As I look back on it, maybe we came in a little too soon.
''But I still think all those good things are going to fall into place someday at A&M. It's a great place. I was happy here. But now I've got another whole chapter to write in Division I football, and I can't wait for the season to get here.''
Whatever happens, Cooper said, he'll always be a Bulldog.
''I'm still in total support of Alabama A&M,'' he said. ''After I went up to Wisconsin, I told my wife to get in touch with Coach (Betty) Austin and let her know I want to keep up my membership in the Bulldog Club.
"Huntsville will always be my home. One of the days, we'll be back for good.''