Faust Set to Step Up Recruiting

AKRON, Ohio —  The University of Akron needs to have a big recruiting year if the Zips are going to be competitive once they move up to NCAA Division I-A, says football Coach Gerry Faust.

But the NCAA has not yet acted on Akron’s request for a waiver that will allow Faust to recruit on an equal basis with other Division I-A colleges. Faust said the NCAA is moving carefully because Akron would be the first school to advance from I-AA to I-A.

“The thing is, schools usually go the other way. Moving up will be a precedent, and they’ve got to work out the red tape,” Faust said.

Athletic director Dave Adams said that Akron expects to hear from the NCAA by Monday regarding the waiver request. The application to move up cannot be formally submitted or approved until next June.

Faust hopes to hear as soon as possible about the recruiting waiver, because big schools can give out a total of 95 scholarships for football. Division I-AA schools are permitted to issue only 70.

“You’ve got to be a heck of a coach at this level,” Faust said. “You’ve got to work with 70 scholarships. It’s tougher, because you’ve got to teach them two positions.”

Faust, who never finished better than 7-5 in his five years as head coach at Notre Dame, coached the Zips to a 7-4 record this year, a mark that he said was both pleasing and disappointing.

“We had to rebuild the defense almost completely this year,” he said. “There really wasn’t much there, period. So we did a lot better than we felt we would from the beginning. But we were disappointed in the last game.”

Akron lost its last game 40-39 Saturday night at Youngstown State--which had also tried to lure Faust after he resigned from Notre Dame. A week earlier, the Zips lost to Eastern Kentucky, ending their hopes of an Ohio Valley Conference title and a playoff bid.

Akron was 8-3 and made the playoffs in 1985 under Jim Dennison, who stepped aside reluctantly and became an assistant athletic director to make room for Faust.

Now, Faust is preparing a recruiting blitz, to begin as soon as the NCAA gives the go-ahead, that will bring 38 to 40 more scholarship athletes to Akron.

“I would be totally shocked” if Akron’s application to move up to Division I-A was rejected by the NCAA’s classification committee, Faust said. He said he would seek work at a Division I-A school if Akron’s application was unexpectedly turned down.

The Zips have met the requirements for the move, including having a stadium capacity of 30,000 (the Rubber Bowl seats 35,000), averaging at least 17,000 in home attendance once every four years (the Zips drew nearly 19,000 a game in 1985, dropping to 16,606 this year), and having at least 60% of the schedule against Division I opponents (seven of 11 Akron opponents next season are in Division I).

Adams said the only remaining obstacle is lining up enough Division I-A opponents in the years after 1987.