UH's next president will go to bat for athletics

By Ferd Lewis and Stephen Tsai
Advertiser Staff Writers

Evan S. Dobelle, who becomes the University of Hawai'i's 12th president July 1, already has served as a mayor and U.S. chief of protocol to President Jimmy Carter. Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser

For one thing, his fantasy baseball team needed a new name.

No longer would the "Gallows Hill Hangmen" — named for a Revolutionary War-era site on the Hartford, Conn., campus where the British were said to have hanged revolutionaries — suffice.

Now, it is the "Rainbow Warriors."

A university president with a fantasy baseball team? A leader of a university system who still has the baseball cards from his youth and tells stories about the time he tried to tackle Boog Powell in a high school football game?

In its new president, a man of varied talents and experiences, UH also got itself a hardcore sports fan. Before he officially moves into Bachman Hall on July 1, Dobelle, a man who already has served as a mayor, U.S. chief of protocol to President Jimmy Carter and Democratic National Committee treasurer, is already showing himself to be cut from a different cloth than a lot of his contemporaries.

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Evan S. Dobelle Age: 55. Family: Wife: Kit. Son: Harry, 14. Education: Bachelor's, master's and doctorate in education from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Master's in public administration from Harvard. Resume: President of Trinity (Conn.) College; president and chancellor of City College of San Francisco; president of Middlesex Community College, Lowell, Mass., Treasurer Democratic National Committee. U.S. chief of protocol for Carter White House. Mayor, Pittsfield, Mass. Salary: $442,000 plus official car and house in Manoa.

Some excerpts:

Q. On athletic competition:

A. It is a wonderful thing to be able to compete. It equalizes you in a way. It tests you. We're 2,400 miles from the Mainland, 3,800 from Japan and 2,700 from Alaska. Just because (some people might think) we're in the middle of nowhere doesn't mean we're nobody. It is important to show ourselves, I think, self-confidence and self-esteem, that we can compete at these athletic contests with folks from other states and do well.

Q. On sports in its place:

A. I certainly don't want to have sports be so big that the only way you can feel validated is if you have a winning team. We also need to make sure (people) understand the university is a very powerful research university.

These are young men and women and they represent, in many ways, the best of Hawai'i and we hope they would compete here, remain here and work and live here. What they learn in those athletic contests is gonna have a lot to do with the success of the state in the future, in my opinion, because they are going to be tested under game conditions. And that's what happens to a lot of folks when they are in their 30s and 40s, and if they are not used to it, they are not gonna succeed. They have to learn that you can come from behind, as Duke showed.

Now, there's a class act. Coach K (Mike Krzyzewski). If you watched, he never moved off that bench. (Gary) Williams was 11 points ahead and you'd have thought he was 20 points behind. But Coach K never moved. He knows those young men had talent but they also had confidence in themselves. And, I see a little bit of a lack of confidence right now in Hawai'i. I see a lack of confidence in the university across the board. Both within and without the university, we have to change all of that at every level, including athletics.

Q. On UH being a member of the Western Athletic Conference:

A. I have a strong belief in competition, and I just want to make sure where we're competing at the present time is appropriate for us. If it's not, we need to do something else. But we are who we play. If that's the right place for us, that's fine. If there's a desire to do something else, and it's a matter of resources or prioritization, then we need to take a look at it. I haven't really spoken to the coaches.

Q. On which conference UH should be a member:

A. The highest level of competition that the coaches tell me that they think we have the resources to compete on. If that's the WAC, that's the WAC. If it's as an independent playing Notre Dame and the military academies ... I don't know.

Is it money? Is it academic standards? What has to be raised to compete at a higher level if the coaches want to compete at a higher level? I have never gone into an institution lowering the bar. My question will simply be: Should we raise the bar? And how long would it take to accomplish that? And how much resources? Do they have the will to do it? I can tell a lot about my coaches if they say, "We're fine." Are they saying that to our players?

I look at the University of Hawai'i as the preeminent public university in the country. That's the only way I know how to compete. I'm not satisfied saying, "We're better than we were." That's obvious. I'm getting paid a lot of money. Hopefully, the college will be better than it is. The reality is, is it everything it could be? That's all I ask of everybody who works with me.

Q. On what his role will be in UH athletics:

A. My role is to make sure my coaches are the highest competitive group of men and women, and to provide the resources for them to compete. And to make sure this is an institution that is absolutely in line with the rules of the NCAA, that my students graduate within six years, that we have opportunities for people from the state to be able to compete at their state university. I'm much more of a facilitator. If I've had success, it's not because I dominate institutions. I listen to what people want ... what the community wants ... what people who pay tax dollars want ... and to make those dreams come true. My job is to make dreams come true for coaches. I'm their coach.

Q. On raising money:

A. It's a major responsibility. I don't want to get in anybody's way. I need to understand the budget. It seems to me they're running pretty close to being in the black this year. I suspect if they went to a bowl game, the athletic department would be in the black, and that's a pretty impressive situation. I would suspect some of the brand-name sports are probably less costly per participant than some of the smaller niche sports. I'm pretty much a 24-7 guy. And if we need to gain resources for our team, we'll figure it out.

Q. On paying competitive salaries for coaches:

A. Whether it's athletics or sociology, the only way you can tangibly give respect to people is not telling them you respect them, you have to pay them. Otherwise, it's just a lot of rhetoric.

Q. On his sports background:

A. I played all sports. I was more of a natural coach than player. I was a popular player, but I was not a great player. Baseball is still my first love. It's a passion. This (time of year) is heaven for me. The major league season has started; I can see box scores again. I have been in a fantasy baseball league for five years. I watched ESPN last night and it's just different. It was highlights of (Pittsburgh Pirates catcher) Jason Kendall getting hit. They said, "Bases loaded and Kendall got hit." It was, "God." I said, "It's an RBI. As long as he didn't get hurt ..."

I know way more than I should know, at my age and for what I do for a living, about how many caught steals Derek Jeter had. But I do. And I always have loved it. I'm the world's biggest fan. There's not a night that I don't watch SportsCenter. There's not a weekend that I don't go to a live athletic event, whether it's my institution or whether it's professional or a high school game. I just like to see them. I know what it does it for kids to test themselves and I know what an influence coaches are. I don't think people understand the influence coaches have on young men's and women's lives.

Q. On whether he would have come to UH if it did not have an athletic program:

A. No. Because I would know they're not competing at all levels. I wouldn't come here if there were no business school or law school or athletics.

To me, there is not a great athlete in Hawai'i ... (who) should ever leave here to go to play competitive sports on the D-I level, for any reason, other than they have a real reason to see California or to see Florida. If they're a top athlete, Hawai'i should be their first choice. We should be competing for kids all over the country.

Do I think we can play against Washington State or UCLA? I don't see why we can't. Are we to suggest that our kids can't compete academically with kids in California? Are we to suggest our lawyers in Honolulu aren't as good as the lawyers in Los Angeles? I mean, why should we ever presume we can't do anything we set our mind to?

Q. On his attitude:

A. I've never gone to a person and told them they're less than they should be. "I want you to be less than you can be. I want you to be kind of what you are." You can be anything. You have to believe in yourself. In high school football, our coach used to say to us — and I can hear him in his Southern drawl — "Never give up nothing to nobody." And we didn't. We'd get beat 50 to nothing, and the coach would always be proud of us because we never gave up "nothing to nobody." They just killed us because they were bigger and faster and better, but we never gave up anything to them. It's hard to say you were proud when you scored a touchdown, but it was a big deal. That's the way I've always believed.

I remember when Jimmy Carter was running for president. I always said we could win. People said, "He's not even the governor of Georgia. He's been out of office for two years." He didn't know who to go see so he saw everybody. And he won. I've never been comfortable with the position of settling. I don't want anybody to settle in life.

Q. On going to UH sporting events:

A. Yes. The University of Hawai'i is interesting because the athletic events give you a sense of alma mater. I assume theater and dance do, too. About 80 percent of the students who go to the university don't live here (on campus). It's not the normal situation you have with universities you compete with. They live at home, they commute, they drive 40 minutes to come to college. They live on one of the (Neighbor) Islands and go home weekends. So, these are activities that bond you. When you talk about resources in the future, if you don't feel bondage, it really becomes a professional degree and not an experience.

They said that last year, seven percent of the living alumni contributed to the University of Hawai'i on an annual basis. There are reasons for that. They've never felt a sense of alma mater. This was a credential they were getting as opposed to an experience. So athletics and theater and dance and working on a student newspaper, all of those things are very important fundamental activities that need to be supported by the colleges. It's more than people think it is.