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August 31, 2006
The Chan Gailey Profile
by
JOHN HAYNSWORTH
Writer
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Chan Gailey enters his fifth season as the Yellow Jackets’ head coach when his team hosts the Fighting Irish on Saturday night. Gailey is a good veteran coach with 32 years of experience to his credit. Half of his career has been at the college level, holding previous head coaching jobs at Troy State and Samford. Interestingly though, his current stint at Georgia Tech ranks as the second longest of his career behind only the six seasons he spent as an assistant at various positions in the Denver Broncos organization.
It is tough to measure what Gailey has meant to the program in his first four seasons. On one hand, it seems rather pedestrian that he has only managed seven wins in each of his first four seasons. Seven wins a season would likely cost a Notre Dame coach his job before the fourth season, let alone the fifth.
 However, what those numbers do not illustrate is a coach who has done a good job to maintain the integrity of a program that is farther removed from its glory days of the early 90’s than Notre Dame. When Gailey took the job at Georgia Tech in December of 2001, his team was in a conference where there was only one real top dog – Florida State. Since then the conference has become significantly more difficult with the additions of Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College in 2004 and 2005. The Yellow Jackets currently share the ACC coastal division with Virginia Tech and Miami.
Combine the sharp increase in competition level with the fact that Georgia Tech’s recruiting territory lies in the heart of SEC country with the Florida powerhouses just across the state’s southern border, and it becomes obvious that Gailey is a part of a building, rather than rebuilding, process that is going to take some time. The Tech program has more problems than a “nasty” attitude change and some tough love can fix.
Give the Tech coaches credit, though. Gailey and his staff have worked hard to keep their heads above water and it has paid off with four straight bowl appearances, including wins in the Humanitarian Bowl in 2003 and the Champs Sports Bowl in 2004. Those four straight bowl appearances extend Tech’s consecutive bowl appearance streak to nine, which is an impressive accomplishment.
Gailey must now focus on getting his team over that seven-win hump, and establishing his team as a contender in the ACC. His teams have shown that they are capable of playing with the better programs in the country. In seasons at Georgia Tech, he has posted six wins over ranked teams with five of those wins coming on the road, including wins at Auburn and Miami last season. He now has to find a way to get his team to play at its highest level every week of the season, especially in conference play, and not just the biggest games of the season.
The Yellow Jackets should have a team capable of making a Cinderella run at the conference championship this season. They return some leadership at key positions on both sides of the ball, but there is no denying that Gailey must get more out of his offense than he did last season. The Yellow Jackets’ offense was less than average in the entire NCAA in terms of overall offensive production. He has identified the offense as an area of concern and made some moves in attempt to spark the offense this season, including handing over the offensive play calling and game planning to offensive coordinator Patrick Nix.
While Gailey is probably not on the “hot seat” just yet at Georgia Tech, he will likely need nine-plus wins this season to keep himself off the “hot seat” heading into next season. He has to show his school, its athletic director, its fans and supporters that he has not reached a plateau and that he is capable of taking the Yellow Jacket program to new heights. There is not a better opportunity to make such a statement than at home opener against the No. 2 ranked Fighting Irish.
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