The whole time, Digger Phelps kept staring at the other bench, and after awhile it became distracting. Here he was, carnation in lapel, a full house at Pauley Pavilion, a national TV audience — exactly the kind of moment he lived for his entire professional life — and he had to keep reminding himself:
Stop looking.
He’s not there.
John Wooden had retired the previous March. He was in the building, but he wasn’t on the bench. Gene Bartow was. As many times as he kept looking for Wooden — program rolled up in his hands, rarely rising from his seat, quietly coaching his UCLA Bruins — Phelps was never going to find him.
“We had a terrific team that year,” Phelps said a few years ago, talking about his 1975-76 Notre Dame Fighting Irish. “We beat them a couple of weeks later, at home. We could’ve beaten them that night (the Irish lost, 86-70), but we were never quite right. I was never quite right. Even before I ever faced him, the one constant in the sport of college basketball was John Wooden on the UCLA bench at Pauley Pavilion.”
All those years later, Digger laughed.
“And suddenly, he wasn’t there.”
Thursday, as the Patriots trotted onto the field at MetLife Stadium, Bill Belichick wasn’t there, and it was easy to see why it took Digger a little while to get used to the idea of a UCLA game without Wooden.
The last time the Jets played the Patriots and someone other than Belichick was coaching them, it was Nov. 15, 1999. The Jets won, 24-17, a Monday night game at old Foxboro Stadium. In a wonderfully symmetrical set of circumstances, that helped grease the skids for Pete Carroll’s exit from New England, which opened the door there for Belichick — who was actually on the field that night, coaching the Jets defense.
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Soon enough, he would be named Parcells’ replacement, he would leave that job after about 15 minutes, he would show up in Foxboro, and he would begin a ceaseless, 24-season march toward Canton, toward immortality — and, if he’s able to find a taker next year, maybe the all-time record for most victories by a coach.
And he owned the Jets.
Owned them.
It took awhile. He blew a big lead the first time he returned to old Giants Stadium to face the Jets, then lost again later that year in Foxboro, and again in Week 2 of the 2001 season, the day when Mo Lewis slammed Drew Bledsoe, sent him to the hospital, and a skinny kid named Tom Brady came in to replace him.
And history would never be the same.
Not simply for the NFL at large — which saw the Patriots win six championships across the next 18 years — but specifically the Jets. Belichick wasn’t perfect against them. Rex Ryan beat him in a playoff game which still reads like a typo when you see the final score. The Jets scratched a few regular-season consolation prizes, too.
After the game that dropped him to 0-3 against the Jets, Belichick had said, “We play in the same division as they do. At some point, we’re going to have to figure out how to beat them.”
And that he did. He won 39 of the last 47 games he coached against the Jets. He won the last eight times they met in New Jersey, including a 15-10 rock fight last year, one of only four games the Patriots won all season. The Jets did win the rematch, Week 18, a 17-3 mess of a game a few days before the Patriots made their parting with Belichick official.
Belichick left behind six championships in New England, and he left behind scorched earth in East Rutherford. So, yes, when Jerod Mayo led the Patriots on the field Thursday night in the Jets home opener, it looked strange for a few minutes, and it’ll take awhile to fully get used to that. But most Jets fans are like Robert Saleh, which means they’ll likely be diametrically opposite Digger Phelps on Jan. 3, 1976.
They won’t miss him even a little it.
