NAU coach helped stoke Hauck’s competitive fires

I was wrong. My thinking was, when informed Jerome Souers first identified Bobby Hauck as a person destined to spend his life watching film and sitting in the living rooms of recruits and coaching football, a handshake must have been the most telling sign.

Hauck has this way of greeting you as if he's wringing out a wet rag ... and his life depends on it being dry.

"No, it wasn't that," said Souers, laughing hard enough to think he is all-too-familiar with Hauck's vise of a grip. "But he has always been an intense guy. That hasn't changed one bit."

The connection dates back more than 25 years, when Hauck was set to take a teaching job and coach high school ball in Montana, where he had been a three-sport star in the town of Big Timber, because this story just wouldn't have the same idyllic feel if someone wasn't from somewhere named Big Timber.

Souers was as assistant at Montana and suggested to head coach Don Read that Hauck, who had aided in the evaluation of local prep players and whose younger brother played for the Grizzlies at the time, would do well as a volunteer assistant.

"It has been a wild ride ever since," Hauck said.

Old friends meet again tonight when Hauck and his UNLV team host Souers and his Northern Arizona side at Sam Boyd Stadium. The two met as head coaches in the Big Sky Conference seven times from 2003 to 2009. Hauck went 7-0.

This would be a horrible time for him to mess with perfection.

It was been nearly a year since the nightmare that was Southern Utah 41, UNLV 16, nearly a year since the Rebels last played a Football Championship Subdivision team it should expose and handle.

It's important the Rebels build off all the good from a 30-27 loss to Minnesota that reached triple overtime of a season opener, critical that obvious progress isn't slowed against an opponent that lost at Arizona State last week, 63-6.

UNLV doesn't merely need to win handily tonight.

It must.

"You can see their improvement on film from last season to this one," Souers said. "It is significant. It doesn't surprise me. Bobby was destined to be in this profession. He has a great understanding of the big picture, a very detailed and specific vision about what needs to be done to win in Las Vegas.

"UNLV hasn't had much football tradition. If given the time, Bobby is someone who can build that foundation. Every school has its own equation to achieve success - some more different and complicated than others - but Bobby Hauck knows how to win games. He knows how to get kids to buy in and through enough will and determination and toughness, he will get it done there."

Souers has been the coach at Northern Arizona since 1998 and three times advanced the Lumberjacks to the 1-AA playoffs, but they last won more than six games in a season in 2003.

They haven't finished above third place in conference since.

UNLV needs more of these types of nonconference games, opportunities to play an inferior side and continue to show progress while building confidence within a program that desperately needs to begin winning.

It's not about the opponent as much as it is the scoreboard. Minnesota was a winnable game and thus a lost chance. The Rebels need to be better technically, more responsible in their assignments, make the types of plays Minnesota did in the end.

You could tell UNLV was more sure of itself to begin this season, bigger, stronger, more physical, not the intimidated and overmatched bunch that backed into Camp Randall Stadium at Wisconsin last year.

The Rebels last week actually looked like real players when warming up for the first time in forever. Tonight, they need to play like them, regardless of any old-time confidantes on the sidelines.

"Jerome is a dear friend and a good football coach," Hauck said. "He was the secondary coach at the time and asked if I would be interested in helping out (at Montana in 1988) and I'll forever be grateful for that opportunity.

"(NAU) was in a tough situation last week. (ASU) has a new coaching staff and (NAU) didn't have any idea what they were going to see. They got ambushed a little bit. In terms of that result and what we'll see (tonight), when you watch them athletically and their ability and size and maturity, I think they will have a good team this year.

"We need not to get sidetracked by that score."

The Rebels need to win big. To dominate. To send a dear friend home 0-8 in these matchups.

You know what I always say - if there is anyone who can separate a job from friendship, it's someone from Big Timber.

Or at least that's what I would like to always say.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He can be heard from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday on "Gridlock," ESPN 1100 AM and 98.9 FM. Follow him on Twitter: @edgraney.