UW trio had perfect game plan
Shalala, Richter, Alvarez revived school’s athletics
MADISON – Donna Shalala was born in Cleveland in 1941, served as the editor of her high school newspaper, graduated from the Western College for Women and joined the Peace Corps in 1962.
Pat Richter was born in Madison in 1941, excelled in multiple sports at East High School and the University of Wisconsin before playing eight seasons in the NFL.
Barry Alvarez was born in Langeloth, Pennsylvania, in 1946, watched exhausted steel mill workers come home at night and realized that life wasn't for him. He went on to play football at Nebraska and soon after got into coaching, a decision that set him on a path that eventually would unite him with Shalala and Richter.
As UW officials honor Alvarez for more than three decades of work at UW, as football coach and athletic director, and search for a new face to oversee the athletic department, it must be noted that Shalala, Richter and Alvarez will be inextricably linked as one.
Shalala, UW's chancellor from 198893, was determined to see a disjointed athletic department rise up and become the equal of the academic side.
Without that vision, Richter doesn't leave his job at Oscar Mayer to return to UW as athletic director in 1989.
If Shalala doesn't bring in Richter and task him with finding a coach capable of building a football program that had a combined record of 6-27 from 1987-89 under Don Morton, there is no telling whether the program would have risen or continued to rot inside an empty stadium.
“Donna had the vision of saying: ‘Why can't we have a world-class athlet
ic program as we do a world-class academic institution?' ” Alvarez said this week during a ceremony to formally announce he is stepping down as athletic director June 30.
Why not Wisconsin?
“And she meant it,” Alvarez added. “She put a lot of work into it. I think she wanted to win as much as I wanted to win.”
Alvarez wanted to win as much as he wanted to breathe.
Football was life.
Richter, equally passionate, faced a monumental task.
The department was about $2 million in debt when he took over as athletic director. UW had successful teams, including men's hockey and the track and cross-country programs. But the men's basketball program hadn't qualified for the NCAA Tournament since 1947 and the football program was arguably the Big Ten's worst.
You want pressure?
Richter was alone at the free-throw line, no time on the clock, for two shots with his team down by two points.
You miss the first shot and the second
Donna Shalala, who was UW’s chancellor from 1988-93, is given gifts by former UW football player Brent Moss and head coach Barry Alvarez during a visit from Al Gore. MJS FILES
is moot.
If Richter didn't hire the right football coach, there was no guarantee he would be around for a second chance.
Now consider how swiftly Richter moved. He was hired on Dec. 15,1989.
Alvarez, who had been the defensive coordinator at Notre Dame, was introduced as UW's head coach 18 days later.
Richter needed barely more than two weeks to hire a coach who transformed the UW football program and helped spark a renaissance within the entire department.
“We started this journey over 30 years ago,” Richter said via video during Alvarez's ceremony. “I remember the first year…we started a marketing promotion of a whole new animal.”
UW finished 0-8 in the Big Ten and 1-10 overall in 1990, Alvarez's rookie season.
“I don't know if I ever told you this,” Richter said, “but after that 1-10 season I got a number of little notes saying: ‘Well, it kind of looks like the same old animal.'
“But those of us that watched closely knew that something was different.”
Three seasons later, UW had a share of the Big Ten title and a victory over UCLA in the Rose Bowl.
“I used to say that building a worldclass athletic department was not much different from building a world-class biochemistry department,” Shalala said via video during Alvarez's ceremony. “It took first-class leadership and ability to recruit and sustain wonderful personnel.
“But more importantly a passion for excellence. That's what Barry Alvarez brought to Wisconsin. …
“He was hungry. He was hungry for excellence.”
Fans and media love to play the what if game.
UW fans wondered what might have been if J.J. Watt had returned for his senior season in 2011 and teamed with Russell Wilson.
Had that happened, Bret Bielema's team might have contended for a national title.
UW fans wondered what might have been if Brian Butch hadn't suffered a season-ending elbow injury in 2007.
The Badgers, seeded No. 2 in the NCAA Midwest Regional, probably wouldn't have fallen to UNLV in the second round of the tournament. Maybe Bo Ryan would have reached the Final Four in that season.
Imagine this:
What if Shalala, the president of Hunter College in Manhattan from 1980-88, wasn't hired as UW's chancellor?
What if Richter stayed Mayer, his home for 17 years?
What if Richter didn't make the right hire?
But Shalala came to Madison and convinced Richter he was the right person to revive UW athletics. Richter made the call by hiring Alvarez. And Alvarez built UW into a consistent winner.
Shalala, Richter and Alvarez will forever be linked as one, a three-person management team that helped change the face of UW athletics.
at Oscar