KNOXVILLE - Every hiring process has a moment - the moment.
Many bosses can tell you the exact moment they knew they wanted to hire someone.
Tennessee men's athletic director Mike Hamilton had that moment with Derek Dooley.
Hamilton spoke to at least 10 somewhat legitimate candidates to replace the polarizing Lane Kiffin, who abruptly left the Volunteers in January to take the head coaching position at Southern California. But Hamilton's decision essentially came down to five or six realistic possibilities. And Dooley, the second realistic candidate he interviewed, quickly supplanted himself atop the list and never left it.
"When you're in a sales position like these guys are in an interview, you're going to get a lot of different lines," Hamilton said. "But Derek's articulation of what he thought it meant to be the head coach at the University of Tennessee, that's really kind of, if you will, the moment.
"To me, it told me that it was more than just, 'I've looked at the media guide and saw that Tennessee's done this and that.' He understood it fundamentally, because he's grown up in our league and around it. Though you would expect that that would be something he would be able to articulate, him articulating it ... really was sort of the defining factor."
In short, Dooley gets it. At the very least, he projects 100 percent confidence that he gets it. He talks like a Southeastern Conference coach. He grins like an SEC coach. He claps his hands like an SEC coach. He cracks funny (but non-offensive) one-liners like an SEC coach.
Derek Dooley looks - and so far has acted - exactly like an SEC coach.
Lane Kiffin did not.
Hamilton doesn't deny that.
"I interviewed some other guys who are very successful, and will be very successful, and I will look forward to watching them," Hamilton said. "But in the end, I was probably overly sensitive to the fact that the last situation wasn't as much of a fit as it needed to be. Lane did a lot of good things in terms of his ability to coach and all those kinds of things. But Derek is just more a fit. I don't know any other way to say it.
"Derek will connect with our fan base. A guy who in his first press conference says 'mama,' 'britches' and 'supper' will connect with our fan base. I get that. It's sweet tea and grits. But it's one thing to say that stuff, and it's another thing to be that stuff. And I think Derek is a consummate Southerner."
But will he win like a consummate Tennessee football coach?
After all, Dooley went 17-20 in three years as Louisiana Tech's head coach, and 4-8 last season.
"What is it about Tennessee AD Mike Hamilton? Yo, dude, feel free to hire a coach with a winning record," wrote Orlando Sentinel columnist Mike Bianchi, who shortly after Dooley's hiring posted a poll asking whether Dooley, former Florida coach Ron Zook or former Georgia coach Ray Goff was the "most questionable coaching hire in SEC history."
Hamilton and Dooley point to other factors. Look at Louisiana Tech's lackluster history, they say. Look at Dooley taking it to a bowl game in 2008, they say. Look at the roster he left compared to the roster he inherited, they say.
But, most importantly, they say don't just look at Louisiana Tech. Look at Dooley's past. Look at father Vince Dooley and mentor Nick Saban. The two most direct influences in Derek Dooley's life have won a combined seven SEC championships and three national titles.
Derek Dooley always has maintained his staunch individuality. He left Athens, Ga., and walked onto the football team at the University of Virginia despite most of his family staying with the Bulldogs. He went to law school when people told him he shouldn't. He then left a law practice to start coaching football when nearly everyone - including his wife's family - told him he was crazy.
"I've just always have a mind of my own," he said. "I think I've shown that every step of the way."
Vince Dooley didn't need to be reminded of that fact.
"Derek proved a long time ago that he's his own man," he said.
Regardless, Derek Dooley had a front-row seat to watch two very different men take very different paths to the top of college football. Now he can show what he learned.
And Hamilton can show what he learned after making what seems now to have been a bad hire.
"Part of our job in athletics is talent evaluation," Hamilton said. "The coaches, really their success or failure depends upon talent evaluation in recruiting the right kind of players and young men, and having them come here. And that really is the same job I have as athletic director. It's talent evaluation, and trying to find fit and what makes sense for our institution, and looking beyond what I would call the top line, black and white number. And also remind yourself that things like Coach (Doug) Dickey was hired here as an assistant off the Arkansas staff. And Phillip (Fulmer) had great success here, but he started off as a coach that had zero wins and zero losses. You look at all those things.
"It's rare in today's world that you're necessarily going out and hiring a guy who has had immense success at one place for a long period of time, and you're bringing them to your institution. That's not to say it doesn't happen. Obviously Nick had a lot of success before he came to Alabama. (Bobby) Petrino had success at Louisville before he got to Arkansas. But it's looking beyond the top line number and understanding where they are, and analyzing things that are below the top line number."
All that ultimately will matter at Tennessee is the top line number, though. Fans will accept struggles this season and possibly the next, but that's about it. Dooley understands the SEC and expectations that come with Tennessee's traditional place near the top of the league.
"This is the program," Dooley said at his introductory news conference. "How could you ask for anything more than the University of Tennessee? I've never been more excited about my future for my family and for a program and for living than I am right now."
If Dooley wants to keep enjoying it, though, he must win.
That's the plan. And Hamilton bought into it.
"When he started talking more definitively about what his program looks like," Hamilton said, "how he manages those special moments with players, those tough moments with players, the kind of young men he wants to recruit, what he's going to do to surround himself with people to have them be successful with people on and off the field, all those sort of detailed management types of issues that become important at this level, it showed a certain maturity and certain understanding of what it's going to take to be successful. And then you talk about mentors and who's affected them and those types of things ... and you just feel good about bringing the man to your institution.
"If you're with him for very long, there's somewhat of a 'no fear' attitude. He came in and said, 'Here's what we're going to do.' And you want a coach that has some confidence in his ability to accomplish those sorts of things."
Count noted college football writer Tony Barnhart in with the believers. Barnhart praised Dooley as if he'd been in the interview room with Hamilton and reacted the exact same way.
"The younger Dooley is not only the right kind of coach, he is the right kind of MAN that Tennessee needs to lead its football program at this point in history," Barnhart wrote. "Tennessee got away from the things that made it great - the fundamental principles of General Neyland - with the hire of Lane Kiffin. It went reaching for something that was totally out of character for the institution hoping to keep pace with the University of Florida and to get back to the top of the SEC. Tennessee is Robert Neyland, Bowden Wyatt, Doug Dickey, Bill Battle, Johnny Majors, Phillip Fulmer and Peyton Manning. It stands for something fundamental and unchanging. It does not alter its mission and values hoping that talented players will come. It offers talented high school students an opportunity to be part of something special - something bigger than themselves.
"Tennessee forgot that for 14 months. With the hiring of Derek Dooley, UT now has a chance to get it back."
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