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WEB SAVVY AND WINS


You wouldn’t think a New York Yankees fan would be comfortable in Worcester, MA but eight years after being hired Ralph Willard has found a home in the middle of Red Sox nation.

It’s been more then just a homecoming for the 1967 graduate of the College of the Holy Cross. After spending five years in the Big East, coaching at the University of Pittsburgh, Willard has really enjoyed his return to the smaller and more intiment environment of mid-major basketball.

“There are far less outside distractions at the mid-major level,” says Willard. “The players are here for all the right reasons. Their passion is for the team and not their own agenda and there is more focus on basketball.”

It has certainly worked out well for Willard who entered the season fifty-four games over .500 (134-80) at his Alma matter, but it isn’t just the game that he has been able focus on. Much to the surprise of many, Willard is pretty Internet savvy and he spends a fair amount of time on one particular site -- CoachRalphWillard.com.

“Having a website gives you the opportunity to sell your program, educate the fans and even expand that fan base,” says Willard. “So much of the perception of your program is based on what is seen or said on television. Having a website gives me you the opportunity to go present things in a different light.”

That’s nothing new. A few years ago it might have raised an eyebrow or two if a coach had a website, but it’s becoming commonplace in today’s landscape. But much like the man, there is nothing common or typical about Willard’s approach to the World Wide Web.

“You have to have fun with it,” he says. “In this business you need to be able to laugh once in a while and I have gotten more then a few laughs, courtesy of the website.”

There hasn’t been much laughing from opponents in the Patriot League over the past seven-plus seasons. After a fifth-place finish in his first season the Crusaders went to three straight NCAA tournaments and four postseason appearances overall (2005 NIT). Bucknell has been the toast of the Patriot League the past couple of seasons, but while the Bison were going to back-to-back NCAA tournaments, Willard amassed 45 wins.

Such accomplishments have not gone unnoticed by those who frequent his web domain.

“I still get the letters sent to the office telling me that I am the village idiot,” laughs Willard, “but I don’t get much of that through the website. I have tried to give the fans an insight into our successes and failures and I think it’s worked well.”

It would be easy and understandable for coaches to screen their email or have someone else handle the replies, but that is not Willard’s style. Noting that if someone can take the time to email him he should take the time to respond personally. And he does to virtually every correspondence he receives.

“The questions and comments are actually very insightful,” says Willard. “I will get questions about our offensive approach if we happen to score in the 40s, but there is never anything in bad taste.”

You would expect this attention to detail for a website from a thirty-something coach not a self-proclaimed “old guy.” Some will say it’s nothing more then self-serving, but that’s not the case. If you are banging on the keys at 2:00 in the morning, it’s passion that drives you.

Willard often works on his ‘team report’ in the middle of the night and these are your 20-second timeout versions. He regularly bangs out 800 to 1,000 word updates. Not an administrative assistant or a secretary, but he himself does the typing.

“It’s not exactly award-winning writing, but it works,” laughs Willard who does get emails from fans pointing out typos. “It is something I have done for a few years now and I really have fun with it.”

Feature writing isn’t the only thing he has been doing at Holy Cross. In seven-plus seasons he has averaged nearly 19 wins per season. In his four seasons at Western Kentucky (1990-94) he averaged over 20 wins a campaign. Ralph Willard knows how to sustain success.

“We have been fortunate here to get some really good kids who really want to play and are dedicated to one another,” says Willard. “We have gotten some kids that may have been overlooked by others, but that is the reality of mid-major basketball.”

He’s the same person he was when he was coaching at Pitt, but many that know him believe he is more relaxed and more comfortable then he was a decade ago. If actions are the true measure then it’s pretty clear he is enjoying life at Holy Cross.

Two years ago, in the midst of a 25-win season, Willard decided to break out a new edition to his wardrobe. The addition was met with some choice commentary from some of his close friends, but the ‘lucky sport coat,’ as he tabbed it, really got legs when it got run on his website.

“You have to be able to poke fun at yourself,” says Willard. “I never believed that dressing up for a game should be a requirement for coaches. Wearing a nice suit should be reserved for the postgame press conference or when meeting alumni. Game attire should be able to absorb sweat and Gatorade and not fall apart. Those thoughts got quite a response from a lot of people.”

Willard had purchased a sport coat off the clearance rack. It was never intended to have a long existence, but instead of collecting lint it collected wins and became a fixture at Holy Cross games during the 2004-05 season.

“I paid $100 for that coat, but it’s worth a lot more now,” says Willard. “Not just because of the wins, but because I have spent well over $3,000 getting it cleaned on a regular basis.”

It’s that type of content that Willard offers up regularly. The clichés, the familiar rhetoric and a reluctance to tell it like it is, are not devices used by Willard on his personal website. He knows how to sustain success and maintain a very good presence on the web.