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http://www.portland.com/sports/college/hockey/020410soll.shtml

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                     Wednesday, April 10, 2002

                     COLUMN: Steve Solloway



                        Now he's the man, no question




                      Copyright  2002 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.









Coach, what did you say to Shawn Walsh when he called, asking you to come to Maine?

What was it like coaching his team? What was it like following the passing of a man like him? Did you have doubts?

  After a successful season under difficult circumstances, Tim Whitehead has earned the right to be UMaine's head coach.

When, where, how, why?

Tim Whitehead heard versions of the same questions 20 times, maybe countless times. In Orono and Portland, Kalamazoo, Mich., and Naples, Fla., and wherever the Maine hockey team traveled.

In Providence, Boston and Worcester, and finally at the end of the last press conference before the game for college hockey's national championship in St. Paul, Minn.

With each patient answer, Tim Whitehead pushed his ego aside. He came to Maine, he said, because he couldn't tell a friend that he wouldn't.

This is Shawn's team, Whitehead would say. Shawn recruited these players, Shawn set in place everything that was needed to win.

Shawn's hockey sweater hung behind the bench. His initials were on his players' sleeves and his words were in the back of their minds.

Game after game in the postseason, Maine players credited the coach who was gone. While the coach who was there quietly listened and nodded his head.

Monday, Whitehead got the appointment he earned. He is Maine's hockey coach. The university did the right thing with brilliant timing, removing the interim tag.

But then, it was a no-brainer. Whitehead is a finalist for college hockey's national coach of the year.

It would have been unimaginable for the university to conduct interviews while he was listening to the applause of his peers.

At Monday's rally on campus, some of the loudest cheers were for Whitehead. The message? He was more than the team's caretaker.

He was the man who helped a campus heal.

Whitehead is a man of emotions, but typically he held them in check as the noise grew.

He understood what he was getting into when he answered Walsh's call. What he didn't know was how he was going to pull it all off after the funeral.

No one did. Walsh's passing set in motion a period that would test them all and certainly change them.

Peter Metcalf, the senior captain, stepped up. One coach from a rival Hockey East team marveled at Metcalf's leadership.

"I've never seen a player so determined to lead his team through sheer force of will," said Brian McCloskey, New Hampshire's associate head coach."

Niko Dimitrakos turned himself into the consummate team player. Given the opportunity, Mike Morrison finally became a front-line goalie.

They all stepped up, from junior forwards Robert Liscak and Lucas Lawson to the freshmen like Troy Barnes and John Ronan and Paul Falco.

They didn't respond to Whitehead at first. He was not Shawn Walsh and he didn't pretend to be. Later, Whitehead said he simply went with gut instincts in dealing with the grief and lapses of concentration.

The players were Walsh's surrogate sons. All of them. And they never looked more vulnerable than the day they filed into St. John's Church in Bangor for the funeral.

Whitehead's task was impossible. He accepted a job where the prospect of failure was a constant. He could have taken the wrong step at every turn.

Throughout his coaching career, Walsh was a strong judge of character. He demanded it from his players and looked for it in his friends.

He didn't make a mistake when he chose Whitehead.

The season that began with such pain ended in triumph. Forget the overtime loss. Walsh's family has.

Five of his seven siblings gathered with their parents to watch the game on television, wrote Maura Walsh Satchell, in an e-mail to the Press Herald.

"We had Shawn's words, 'If you can't have the best of everything, make the best of everything you have' above the television screen.

"At the end of the game, we were reminded of Shawn's words. We had to look for the silver lining and we did, with ease.

"We feel such love and joy for the team and their efforts and dedication. For Tim Whitehead, whose sensitivity to our loss has earned him several friends for life.

"For a game that was truly a contest of champions and worthy of Shawn's memory in every sense.

"What a team. What a  season."

And now it's over.

Shawn Walsh's team is now Tim Whitehead's, the man who was tested most of all.

Staff Writer Steve Solloway can be contacted at 791-6412 or at: [log in to unmask]