It was an ordinary April day. The Syracuse track and field team sat stretching in a broken circle on Vielbig Track – the Orange’s normal pre-practice routine. But then Andrew Roberts rolled into practice.

Literally.

The 48-year old Roberts, who spent his last 21 years at SU, blindsided some runners on a children’s scooter, fresh off the shelf at Wal-Mart.

But as quickly as he scampered into practice that day, Roberts will leave SU after eight years as head coach and 13 as an assistant.

Roberts announced he will leave the team after this season at its annual awards banquet at the Genesee Grande Hotel on May 4. After meeting with new athletic director, Daryl Gross, Roberts said they reached the decision together.

‘I realized that in order for the program to move forward, it needed something new,’ Roberts said. ‘It didn’t need my 20 years anymore, and I needed to start fresh. In a perfect world, I’d still be at Syracuse. We’re under new leadership, so let (Gross) lead.’

The track and field team has been a middle-of-the-pack finisher in the Big East Conference for the past several years. Roberts said recruiting was difficult because of limited scholarships and the Central New York weather. The women’s team finished sixth and the men’s team finished seventh last weekend at the Big East Championships at Rutgers.

‘I’d been given my time,’ Roberts said. ‘The lack of results, the lack of movement, is my burden. I cannot shift the blame to anyone.’

During his tenure at SU, Roberts devoted all his time to getting athletes in peak physical shape. At the same time, he smoked enough cigarettes to cause the team’s seniors to buy him a silver cigarette case as an end-of-the-year present, his name engraved alongside a winged track shoe. His athletes say he’s intense during workouts, but that he shows his humorous side in instances like the scooter practice.

Roberts’ departure was somewhat of a surprise to the program. Athletes said they heard rumors but never thought his departure was imminent.

‘It seemed like he had finally got to a point in his coaching where he’s been starting to come around and be more of a support that the team needs,’ said senior high-jumper Jenna Grimaldi. ‘I understand where Coach Roberts is coming from, resigning with the new AD coming in. It’s sad that he gets to take that new attitude somewhere else.’

Grimaldi said Roberts was a tough man to get along with her first two years at Syracuse, but that they have come to understand each other more before it was too late.

Big East champion sprinter Aulton Kohn butted heads with Roberts in his first two years also, but at the awards banquet Kohn told his coach that everything was OK between them. When the sophomore finished second on Sunday in the 100-meter dash by a mere thousandth of a second, Roberts was there with a congratulatory and consoling hug.

Freshman hurdler Marcus Vaughn, usually a bundle of jitters before a race, said Roberts sat down with him Friday for a while to talk, calming him down. As a result, Vaughn ran a personal-best time, two tenths of a second faster than his previous best.

‘He taught me a lot in the last eight months,’ Vaughn said. ‘He taught me about life. I’m just trying to absorb it all. He knows a lot. He’s a good man.’

A good man who started his coaching career in 1979 at Tennessee after an All-American hurdling career at Southern Illinois. Roberts also coached at UCLA before he was hired in 1984 at SU by former athletic director Jake Crouthamel. Crouthamel described Roberts as a go-getter and a good recruiter who worked his way up in the coaching ranks.

‘Andy is a very introspective individual,’ he said. ‘He is a thinker and a planner and someone who puts a lot of thought into what he’s doing with the student-athletes.’

No one knows that more than graduate assistant coach Dave Hegland. Roberts compiled a talented coaching staff and added Hegland in 2004 to help him with sprints and hurdles.

‘He was always thinking about how to make the team better,’ Hegland said. ‘I can’t tell you how many phone calls I got at 11:30 at night, seven in the morning, bouncing ideas off me. His mind was always thinking about the program. He was absolutely committed to doing that. He’s really one of the smartest guys I’ve ever met, period.’

Smart enough to realize that pushing off a scooter helped isolate a specific sprinting motion. Roberts was also committed to helping his athletes. Many, like Kohn or Grimaldi, didn’t get the message at first. You have to look at Roberts a particular way to get the message, Grimaldi said.

‘He just stares at you trying to tell you that he cares with his eyes,’ Grimaldi said. ‘It’s really soothing in a time of need.’

The crowd at the awards banquet was transfixed when Roberts announced he wouldn’t be back next year. After the seniors each gave speeches of thanks, Roberts thanked them as a class, his last at Syracuse. There was no shortage of tears as many sobbed during Robert’s passionate farewell.

Crouthamel thinks Roberts is strong enough to handle an administrative job at Syracuse, something Roberts hasn’t ruled out. He isn’t sure if he’ll get back into coaching, though. Roberts said he needs to find another place that feels like home.

‘I must decide in the next few months if there’s something here that I can be of benefit of to the institution and still better myself,’ Roberts said. ‘The only reason that’s a viable question is because there’s good will so I must have done something right.’

The status of the assistant coaches is uncertain, according to senior associate athletic director Mark Jackson. Roberts admitted to being selfish in leaving their careers uncertain, but said they are great people with great hearts who he just can’t save.

Roberts started his career at SU in an office that’s now a janitor’s closet in Manley Field House. After 21 years, he moved into a real office and his blood became orange, a tint that he said will last, though he insists it was time to move on.

‘I’m not gonna wallow,’ Roberts said. ‘I’m going to succeed; it’s a part of me. I’m a competitor. Sometimes in order to move ahead, you gotta shake off the past.’

He appeared to be having a hard time doing that at the Genesee Grande Hotel. He looked his athletes in the eyes as they thanked him, trying to hold back tears. He said he only shakes hands with male athletes, but they hugged him. And Roberts hugged back.

No search has begun yet for Roberts’ replacement. Roberts will travel to his last few meets and then return to Syracuse, the city that welcomed him from the Midwest so well that Roberts’ favorite part of the year is winter now, a time Roberts calls soothing. But the response from the track and field team he tried to build was the most soothing thing he’s ever witnessed. Even without the championships he envisioned.

‘To know you’re still loved afterwards, that’s home,’ he said. ‘Maybe I didn’t fail.’

Published on May 10, 2005 at 12:00 pm