Eastern’s coaches fielding a family team

In the wake of all that its football coaches have done recently to help boost the sales of Father’s Day cards, fundraisers for the Eastern Washington University athletic department might consider hitting up Hallmark for a donation.

Since late December, four members of the Eagles’ football staff – including head coach Paul Wulff – have welcomed additions to their families.

“I guess you could say we have plenty of proud fathers on our staff,” said Wulff, whose wife, Sherry, gave birth to their second child, Sam, on May 19. “People are going to start wondering if we’re spending enough time in the office.”

Prior to the Wulffs’ latest arrival, defensive coordinator Jody Sears and his wife, Molly, became parents for the fifth time, when son Charlie Ray arrived on April 22. Wide receivers coach Keith Murphy became a father when his wife, Carrie, gave birth to daughter Lexi Rose on Jan. 31. And on Dec. 30, 2005, linebackers coach Travis Niekamp and his wife, Tracy, welcomed their second son, Dexter Cole, into the family.

Along with pumping a few extra dollars into the greeting card industry, this latest flurry of births at Eastern has forced Wulff to become more flexible with the work demands he makes on his assistants.

It’s a challenge he seems to welcome.

“I try to be as flexible as possible, particularly during the season,” Wulff said. “I know in this business there are some crazy hours for football coaches, but I do my very best to make sure we carve time out for family.

“I think we do as good a job at that as anybody in the country, at the college level.”

During the season, Wulff usually invites his assistant coaches and their families over to his house after games. And when the Eagles are playing on the road, he tries to set up a staff dinner on Thursday evenings before the team leaves on Friday.

“The chaos can be quite amazing,” he admitted. “When we go to a restaurant, we have to ask for the banquet room to let all the little ones run wild. It’s hectic, but it’s fun to see all the kids when they get together.

“They’re each other’s best friends, really.”

Murphy, as a first-time father, said he’s deeply appreciative of Wulff’s family-first approach.

“He’s been wonderful,” he said. “Even before, when we were more of a single staff, he was always into get-togethers, and he hasn’t changed in that respect. His philosophy has always been for us coaches to make sure we have time for family outside of football.”

Murphy said the timing of his daughter’s Jan. 31 arrival – just a day before recruits officially signed their letters of intent with NCAA universities – was perfect.

“All of our recruiting was done, we were in a dead period and we couldn’t be out on the road,” he explained. “After the signing day, all of the coaches kind of get some time off, so it was a really good deal where I could be a part of everything.”

As a joke, one of the assistant coaches typed up an EWU letter of intent with Lexi Rose’s name on it and had it signed by the athletic director.

“That was kind of neat,” Murphy said. “Who knows? I might end up holding them to that.”

“There’s no question we promote family around here, and we do that by example,” said Wulff, who has been the Eagles’ head coach for the past six seasons. “We even sell family in recruiting.

“We’ve created a great family atmosphere around here, and that’s always been a big, important part of what I wanted to do as a head coach. More and more of our coaches are married and have families now, and you’ll see a lot of the little ones running around at practice.”

This latest wave of births brings the number of children on Eastern’s staff to 18, with offensive coordinator Beau Baldwin and his wife, Nicole, expecting their second.

“It’s like we’ve never not had someone pregnant,” Wulff said, “which concerns me a little bit. People are wondering if we’re really coaching.”

Eagles men’s head basketball coach Mike Burns, whose wife, Mary, is due to deliver twins – the couple’s first children – in September, considers himself one of the football team’s biggest supporters.

But he couldn’t resist a quick dig at his close friends on the coaching staff and jokingly warned against viewing future class photos in the Cheney High School yearbook.

“Starting in about 15 years, with my kids and their kids, those graduating classes aren’t going to be pretty,” he said. “Let’s just hope they all end up looking like their mothers, because in football terms, we all outkicked our coverage as far as our wives are concerned.”

Wulff said all of the newest dads, moms and kids on his staff are doing well.

“We’re really blessed in that regard,” he said. “The whole thing makes me feel good. We’ve got good coaches and good parents here, not just people who have kids.”

Which, in Wulff’s opinion, is a group of parents – mothers and fathers, alike – well worth celebrating.