‘They imagine’: South Florida’s sizzling begin isn’t any fluke

TAMPA, Fla. — USF coach Alex Golesh repeated the identical factor after each of his group’s first two wins — a surprising blowout within the season opener towards Boise State, and one other shocker final weekend towards Florida — “This ain’t the same ol’ South Florida, my brother!”

The 2-0 Bulls are ranked for the primary time since 2018, notched the primary win at school historical past over the Gators and are an early favourite to win the Group of 5 computerized berth into the College Football Playoff.

But there’s extra that means behind these phrases, greater than only a assertion about massive nonconference wins. Those 9 phrases are a nod to one in every of Golesh’s shut buddies.

On the aspect of his headset, Golesh has the initials AAR, for the late USF males’s basketball coach Amir Abdur-Rahim.

Golesh and Abdur-Rahim have been employed inside three months of one another, comparable coaches with comparable beliefs, tasked with the identical purpose: Get USF to shed its underachiever standing. Abdur-Rahim had carried out it at his earlier cease at Kennesaw State, creating the Owls from being a one-win group to reaching the NCAA match.

Golesh had inherited a one-win soccer program and seemed to Abdur-Rahim for recommendation. A couple of days after Abdur-Rahim was employed, Golesh went to see him in his workplace.

“They had literally just done at Kennesaw what we were trying to do, build it the right way,” Golesh stated.

The two hit it off instantly. Their youngsters went to the identical colleges. Their wives turned buddies. That first spring they have been collectively, in 2023, Abdur-Rahim would come out to observe and shortly turned a fixture across the soccer program.

He would textual content Golesh after video games that first season and supplied his ideas on a four-year plan for achievement. Golesh and his son, Barrett, would go to basketball video games as Abdur-Rahim led USF to its finest season ever in 2023-24, successful its first convention title and a school-record 25 video games. It was throughout that run that Abdur-Rahim went viral for saying, “This ain’t the same ol’ South Florida, my brother!”

As the Bulls completed off their 34-7 win over Boise State on Aug. 28, Golesh felt a presence round him. He thought again to what Abdur-Rahim instructed him from the very starting: Year 3 is when the gamers cease hoping they will win. Now, they begin believing they will win.

“Amir used to always say, ‘They ain’t gonna believe until they see it,” Golesh instructed ESPN. “I felt like, ‘All right. They believe.'”

That perception is why USF is 2-0. The query is: How did Golesh get them to imagine?

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When Golesh met with then-USF athletic director Michael Kelly to debate the open head teaching job in December 2022, he had questions. USF had moments of success in its quick soccer historical past — together with back-to-back 10-win seasons in 2016 and 2017 — however its newer report was abysmal. The Bulls completed 2022 with a 1-11 report and 4 complete victories over a three-year span. And this system had by no means gained a convention title.

Golesh needed to know straight away — Would USF present the sources required to win? Would they provide him time to show this system round? The reply to each was a powerful sure.

“His experience at other places showed what he felt he needed,” Kelly instructed ESPN. “I never felt it was unreasonable. It was just, ‘This is the way it is if we’re going to win this league.'”

Kelly stated the workers measurement elevated, and an extra $1.5 million was added to the assistant coach wage pool. The recruiting finances elevated. Golesh additionally had the complete vitamin, energy and conditioning program and athletic coaching workers revamped.

Under the earlier workers, for instance, gamers received breakfast and lunch however no dinner on the facility. But now, they get three meals a day and have entry to a vitamin bar within the weight room. Plus, there are totally stocked mini-fridges and snack baskets in each group assembly room.

There was no larger signal of dedication to soccer than the approval of an on-campus $349 million soccer stadium, set to open in 2027, an concept that had been many years within the making. Most days, USF gamers observe to the sound of metal pillars going into the bottom, simply past the observe fields.

“It just goes together with what we’re doing on the football field, building a foundation,” quarterback Byrum Brown says. “We put the dirt down. We’re putting up poles. We’re seeing what this program can really be for years to come.”

Resources are one factor. Buy-in and perception are one other. Center Cole Best remembers a gathering Golesh had with returning gamers throughout his second day on the job.

“He said, ‘I just need a little blind faith,'” Best stated. “And I said, ‘I’m going to give it to him, and I’m going to buy into whatever this is. It was difficult at times, but I knew within his first couple of days here that, ‘This is the guy.'”

Sixth-year linebacker Mac Harris, who was on these three USF groups that gained 4 complete video games earlier than Golesh arrived, stated these groups typically discovered methods to chop corners, or prevented doing what was arduous and uncomfortable.

Golesh’s Bulls do not take the straightforward method out.

“AG says it all the time, leave no rock unturned. Check every detail, go through every obstacle you have to go through the right way,” Harris says. “Some people call them cliches, but they mean something, and they hold weight. I think doing that each and every day, and holding your teammates accountable to it, and them holding you accountable to it, created an expectation to win.”

In his first season as head coach, USF went 7-6, the second-best win enchancment amongst all FBS packages in 2023. Then final season, USF confirmed glimpses of its potential, enjoying Alabama shut for 3 quarters earlier than shedding, after which enjoying Miami shut for a half earlier than shedding. Brown missed the ultimate seven video games of the season with a decrease leg damage and USF nonetheless completed 7-6 and made it to a different bowl sport.

With a wholesome Brown and 15 different starters again, Golesh and his group felt optimistic concerning the potentialities for this season.

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Yes, the begin to the 2025 season got here up throughout his job interview, as Golesh was future schedules with Kelly. He seemed down and noticed a three-game nonconference doozy: Boise State, at Florida, at Miami. There was preliminary skepticism. Not as a result of Golesh needed to shrink back from enjoying these groups. But enjoying all three in a row, in the identical season, appeared, properly, “kinda crazy.”

“The initial conversation was, ‘We’ll handle that as we get there, but it won’t look like that,” Golesh stated. “We got to last January, and it still looked like that, and I’m like, ‘You know what? Let’s go play them.”

Last June, when Kelly was on the point of go away USF to take the athletic director job at Navy, Golesh instructed him, “We’re going to go win those games, and you’re going to tell me, ‘I told you so.'”

If the win over Boise State had folks throughout the nation take discover, the win over Florida legitimized USF in a much bigger method. For many years, there was the “Big Three” within the state of Florida: Miami, Florida State and Florida. UCF made it right into a Power 4 convention when it joined the Big 12, leaving USF preventing for nationwide relevance within the Group of 5.

That helps clarify why Golesh had 500 textual content messages ready for him after the 18-16 come-from-behind win over the Gators.

Best stated he had eight former teammates name him after that win to congratulate him. “It brings tears to my eyes,” Best says. “I took a step back and let it all soak in. It hasn’t been easy. It’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life, and to see it pay off, it just means the world.”

The course of is the method, so there was no time this week for USF to rejoice a 2-0 begin. Not with a visit to No. 5 Miami on deck. Golesh got here into the workplace final Sunday and says he “ripped apart” the sport tape together with his workers.

“We haven’t arrived,” Golesh says. “We have two really good wins. We have another really good game, and then we’ve been really average in this conference for the last two years. We have so much left to do.

“As Amir used to say, ‘Headphones on. Hear nothing.”

There is a sadness in his voice as he recalls those conversations with Abdur-Rahim. They were supposed to be doing this together, celebrating each other’s wins as if they were their own. After Abdur-Rahim got sick last fall, he stopped coming around to practice but refused to tell Golesh what was wrong.

Then Golesh got a long text from Abdur-Rahim. He still has it saved in his phone. Abdur-Rahim wrote, in part, he was ready to fight what was ailing him, but seemed unsure whether doctors had any answers.

Abdur-Rahim died Oct. 24, 2024, at age 43, from complications that arose during a medical procedure related to his undisclosed illness. The loss was felt across the entire USF community, including the football team. As a lasting tribute to his friend, Golesh had a picture of Abdur-Rahim speaking to the team one day at practice enlarged and placed in the hallway of the football facility.

“Coach Golesh giving us a reminder of what a fantastic human being he was, and what a fantastic coach he was, and the teachings and recommendation that he instilled in us, it means rather a lot,” Brown says.

Golesh may not have responded to every single one of the hundreds of text messages he has received over the past two weeks. But there are two that he will never forget. Arianne Abdur-Rahim, Amir’s widow, texted Golesh after the Boise State win and again after the Florida win.

“Amir is looking for you.”