After 13 seasons, Cooper fired after Outback Bowl loss

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- As John Cooper made his farewell speech after being fired as Ohio State's coach, the reasons for his dismissal could be seen just over his shoulder.

A sign on the wall behind Cooper read: "Program Goals: 1, Earn an OSU degree. 2, Win the Big Ten championship. 3, Win the BCS. 4, Win the national championship."

Ohio State athletics director Andy Geiger fired Cooper on Tuesday after 13 years in the wake of Monday's 24-7 loss to South Carolina in the Outback Bowl. But Geiger stressed Cooper wasn't fired because of one loss, but because of a steady "deterioration" of the program.

"I've been concerned about the climate in the football program," Geiger said.

Cooper's graduation rate was among the worst in the Big Ten, and he lost a starting wide receiver prior to the Outback Bowl who had a 0.00 grade-point average in the fall quarter.

The Buckeyes never won an outright conference title under Cooper, sharing three crowns. It's been 16 years since Ohio State finished alone atop the conference standings, the longest such drought since an 18-year span in the 1920s and 1930s.

And Ohio State, despite a pair of No. 2 finishes in the polls, never played for a national title.

"Does there need to be more discipline on this football team? Absolutely," Cooper said Tuesday at the facility named after Ohio State coach Woody Hayes. The late Hayes is the only Ohio State coach to serve longer (28 years) and win more games (205-61-10).

Cooper said he was shocked by the firing.

"It was unexpected," he said. "I thought I'd coach one more year."

Cooper disputed the concerns mentioned by Geiger, saying he could not think of an off-the-field problem that affected his team.

Yet in the weeks leading up to the bowl game, teammates criticized each other, the team MVP showed up late and missed the team's first practice in Tampa and one offensive lineman sued another for $50,000 because of a fight on the field last spring.

Ohio State will pay Cooper $1.8 million to buy out the last three years of his contract, which paid him more than $1 million per season.

The fall was precipitous for Cooper, 63, whose teams went 111-43-4 and finished second in the final AP poll in 1997 and again in 1999.

But Cooper's Buckeyes also struggled in big games. Cooper was just 2-10-1 against archrival Michigan, and his bowl record was 3-8. Five times in his 13 years, the Buckeyes closed out their season with consecutive losses against Michigan and in a bowl game.

Ironically, Cooper was hired because of a win over Michigan while coaching Arizona State in the 1987 Rose Bowl.

Cooper could not lead the Buckeyes to a national title -- its last one was in 1968 -- but he came close.

In 1995, the Buckeyes won their first 11 games before losing at No. 12 Michigan, 31-23. Five weeks later, Ohio State lost to Tennessee 20-14 in the Florida Citrus Bowl.

The 1996 team won its first 10 games and was ranked No. 2 when it fell to No. 21 Michigan 13-9. That team rebounded to edge Arizona State 20-17 in the Rose Bowl in the final seconds.

Ranked No. 1 in the preseason, the 1998 team stayed atop the polls until Nov. 7, when it lost to 17-point underdog Michigan State. The Buckeyes won their last three games, including victories over Michigan and against Texas A&M in the Sugar Bowl, to again finish No. 2 in the final rankings.

Cooper never could compete with the revered Hayes, who died in 1987.

"About 95 percent of these people have been great to me,"

Cooper said. "There's some people in this town that nobody's going to please. Coach Hayes didn't please them and coach Bruce didn't please them. And the next coach is not going to please them."

The heat was turned up after a 6-6 season in 1999 in which the Buckeyes closed with three consecutive losses and then failed to make a bowl trip for the first time since Cooper's first season.

This year, the Buckeyes won their first five games to climb as high as No. 6 before losing four of their last seven. Despite losses to Minnesota and Purdue, Ohio State still had a chance at a share of the Big Ten title in the annual regular-season finale against Michigan. But Ohio State blew a 9-0 lead and failed on a fourth-and-1 late in the game as Michigan took a 38-26 victory.

Geiger said he had no answers for what went wrong with the program.

"I wish I could explain it, but there has been a slide, and it's why we're here," he said.