Eags turn to Plan B-aldwin

It is always satisfying to see a plan come together – even if it is Plan B.

Few, it would seem, can attest to that fact with as much conviction as first-year Eastern Washington University athletic director Bill Chaves, who officially introduced Beau Baldwin as the Eagles’ 20th head football coach during a hastily called press conference on Friday afternoon.

“After three weeks of intensive work to find the right person to take over Eastern football, we’re extremely excited to say we found that man,” Chaves said of Baldwin, a former offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach for the Eagles, who led his alma mater, Central Washington University, to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Division II playoffs during his first and only season as a college head coach last fall.

The 35-year-old Baldwin, who was an assistant under his EWU predecessor Paul Wulff from 2003-06, accepted the job Thursday afternoon, less than 12 hours after Chaves’ first choice, Fresno State offensive coordinator Jim McElwain, had turned it down.

But the sudden shift to Plan B seemed to matter little to Chaves, who called Baldwin a “rising star in the football coaching industry,” and “the perfect fit” for Eastern.

Baldwin’s contract is a three-year deal with two rollover years and includes a starting base salary of $100,000 a year, which is $3,000 less than Wulff was making prior to accepting the head coaching job at his alma mater, Washington State, in mid-December.

According to Chaves, more than 50 potential candidates expressed an interest in Eastern’s vacancy and 10 “very diverse individuals” ended up getting interviews.

As EWU’s next coach, Baldwin will inherit 30 returning players with starting experience on last year’s 9-4 team that advanced to the second round of the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision playoffs before losing on the road to eventual national champion Appalachian State 38-35.

While expectations heading into next season will be off the chart for many Eastern fans, Baldwin insisted he can deal with those, and said he will not put talk about a national championship off limits to his players.

“I’m not afraid to talk about the big prize,” said Baldwin. “I don’t think that is bad, as long as the players and everyone else understands the process it takes to get there, and those are things I’ll keep reminding them of. If you want to talk about a national championship, you have to be willing to then turn around and be willing to do all those little things between January and August.”

Several of the Eagles’ key returning players who got wind of Baldwin’s hiring reacted positively when reached on Friday.

“I was real happy when I heard about it,” said sophomore wide receiver Aaron Boyce, who caught 85 passes for 1,308 yards and 10 touchdowns last fall. “You always kind of pull for the guys you know. I had a lot of fun with him when he was here before, and I know he did some really good things at Central.”

Sophomore quarterback Matt Nichols, who threw for 3,744 yards and a school record 34 touchdowns en route to being named the Big Sky Conference’s offensive player of the year, said Baldwin’s hire is “great” for Eastern’s program because “we have a guy coming in who’s going to keep doing the things we’ve been doing and not change everything.”

Nichols, who threw a school-record 17 interceptions as a redshirt freshman starter in 2006 when Baldwin was still the Eagles’ OC and quarterbacks coach, admitted the two “had our differences” during a troubling 3-8 season.

“Most of them, though, were because I was playing so bad, and the team was playing so bad,” he said. “It was just a stressful time. But I’m excited about him coming back. I think he’ll hit the ground running, and I’m sure he’ll still keep a hand in coaching us quarterbacks and calling plays, because he’s an offensive-minded guy.”

Junior defensive end Greg Peach likes the hire, too.

“I thought it was pretty cool,” he said, “because I know Coach Baldwin from my freshman year. He recruited me, actually, and I’m happy for him. But I don’t know who he’s going to bring in with him, so I have no idea who I’m going to be talking to as my position coach or who’s going to be coaching me.”

Baldwin, who will meet with his Eastern players sometime next week after they return from their holiday break, expects to spend the next few days assembling his coaching staff and plans to bring several of his former CWU assistants with him to Cheney.

He insists he will not make any major changes to the things that made the Eagles so successful last fall – like the spread formation and no-huddle offense.

“I’m going to keep a lot of things familiar to returning players, because I think that’s important,” he said. “I have to be smart about doing what’s best for Eastern football and not try to get into an ego deal with myself, because that’s not what it’s about.”

Baldwin had a huge impact at his alma mater in his first season as a head coach last fall, leading CWU to a 10-3 record and into the quarterfinals of the NCAA Division II playoffs. The Wildcats’ record was the school’s best since 1995 when it won the NAIA championship.

During his previous stay at Eastern, Baldwin’s offense – behind Payton Award-winning quarterback Erik Meyer – twice ranked in the top 10 nationally in total offense. The Eagles averaged 475.5 yards per game to rank sixth nationally in 2004 and 477.8 yards per game the following year to rank fourth.

Baldwin first came to EWU in 2003, replacing Timm Rosenbach as offensive coordinator. Prior to that, he spent nine seasons as an assistant at his alma mater, serving the last seven under John Zamberlin, the man he replaced at Central.

As a quarterback at CWU, Baldwin was a two-time team captain, whose career completion percentage of .614 is still the school’s best.

Baldwin grew up in Tacoma and graduated from Curtis High School in 1990. He and his wife, Nicole, who is from Spokane and graduated from EWU in 2000, have two daughters, Mia Janae, 3, and Macie Patricia, 1.