Carroll fueled by past failure with Jets
Andrew Theodorakis/New York Daily NewsPete Carroll spoke from the NFL mountaintop Monday morning, a 62-year-old with a 26-year-old's passion, stripped of any bitterness that could have anchored him all those years ago when he was unceremoniously dumped by the Jets.
Two decades after Leon Hess canned Carroll after one measly season, the guy who sounds like the cool kid we all knew in high school returned to the scene of the crime for his greatest triumph.
'That moment in time to me is just a moment in time,' Carroll said of his time with the Jets after he had hours to digest Seattle's first Super Bowl win. 'It didn't dampen my spirits. It didn't slow me down. If anything, it just kicked me in the butt in a better way. Then, I got kicked a little harder in New England. I hate to learn the hard way, but sometimes that's what has to happen.'
Carroll, the third oldest head coach to hoist the Lombardy Trophy, partied through the night after the Seahawks' Super Bowl XLVIII rout over the Broncos, a celebration 19 years in the making for a coach kicked to the curb by one of the league's star-crossed franchises.
He was fired from his first NFL coaching gig after the Jets went 6-10 in 1994 thanks to a late-season collapse highlighted by the infamous fake-spike game.
'I don't have any ill feelings about it at all,' Carroll said. 'I would have loved to have killed it here. I really would. What better place than to do it here. But it didn't work out that way. So that's the way it goes.'
Carroll insisted all along that he had moved on from that part of his life, learned from the experience and grown to become a better coach, but this moment clearly was more special given the circumstances.
'Coaching in New York... I loved it,' Carroll said. 'I had the greatest opportunity in the world to be a head coach in the New York area. We all understand why that's so powerful. It's disappointing that I didn't have a chance to see it through.'
Carroll made history anyway.
He became the third head coach to win the Super Bowl and NCAA title (along with Barry Switzer and Jimmy Johnson). The 43-8 rout over the Broncos had a distinctly familiar feel for Carroll, who had some success with the Patriots before building a juggernaut at USC. Carroll left for Seattle four years ago before USC was hit with NCAA sanctions.
'This game was very similar to the Oklahoma game,' Carroll said, drawing a parallel with USC's 55-19 win in the 2004 Orange Bowl. 'This game was very similar to multiple Rose Bowl championship games. It was just like those games. It felt like it, it looked like it, the score was like it... I sat back there at the end of the first quarter and went, 'Oh, shoot... here it goes.' Then... bang bang bang bang... it's 22-0 at halftime... I'm very proud of it. And I'm thrilled that we've seen it in one area and were able to bring it to the NFL and recreate it.'
'For the fans that have watched us over the years in Southern California,' Carroll added. 'I would think they took great pride in what happened (Sunday) night. Because they understand what they just watched.'
So did the rest of the NFL.
It began two decades ago with the Jets. Failure ultimately fueled success.
'I've learned to appreciate what a great place this is,' Carroll said. 'Pretty cool to come back and get a win.'
NOTES:
Seahawks owner Paul Allen was among the team's contingent to party through the night.
'We had a great party that was thrown at our place,' Carroll said. 'How good is it when you have your owner up on stage playing his guitar with his own band? Paul was hot last night. He was tearing it up, big licks.... I think Paul picked up the bill, too, which is fun.'
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Super Bowl MVP Malcolm Smith, a seventh-round draft pick, gave hope to every player that wasn't invited to the Combine.
'I guess there's unlimited possibilities,' said Smith, who received the keys to his new truck Monday morning for winning the MVP award. 'That's not the end of your story.'
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The morning after the Seahawks nearly pitched a shutout against the most prolific offense in NFL history, Carroll wasn't about to anoint his defense among the best of all-time.
'I think you look back years down the road, and you access what you accomplished with a group,' Carroll said. 'You can take account of it then. I think when you're in the middle of it, it's not time to talk that way. We don't know. We put together a couple of good seasons, back-to-back really big-time seasons in scoring and playing good, solid defense in a similar fashion. That's pretty cool. When the names of the teams and the years of (the all-time best defenses) come up, you have many big-time defenses that have played. We'll see. You have to look back, I think, and evaluate rather than call it right now. You won't get me doing that.'
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Carroll was in favor of shutting down Seattle-area schools for the Seahawks' parade on Wednesday.
'There's no fan base that deserves this more,' Carroll said. 'Nobody has worked harder at supporting their team with more passion and love and spirit than ours. Yeah, let's shut down the darn schools. Let's have a darn celebration.'
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Mother Nature waited 24 hours before dropping snow in the New York/New Jersey region. Weather for a non-factor on Super Sunday, prompting Carroll to crack on Monday, 'I don't know how the Commissioner pulled this one off... The NFL's powerful.'
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