MORGANTOWN - When West Virginia hired Rich Rodriguez to coach its football team in late November of 2000, it marked a departure from the status quo and everyone knew it.

Never had the school made such an abrupt change in philosophy in one of its two major sports of football and men's basketball. Think about it.

Sure, WVU had hired new coaches that were, well, just different from the old ones. But many of the hires over the years had simply been promotions from within or guys - young or old - who were, shall we say, mainstream.

In football, Don Nehlen was as old-school as they come, having been raised on Midwestern and Big Ten football. Frank Cignetti and Bobby Bowden before him were already on staff. Jim Carlen was a Bobby Dodd disciple. Gene Corum was on Pappy Lewis' staff for 10 years and Lewis had been on the job since 1950. Should we go on?

In basketball, perhaps the closest thing to Rodriguez was actually Gale Catlett. Like Rodriguez, he was a WVU grad who had gone on to make a name for himself coaching elsewhere, at Cincinnati. When he returned, he brought with him a reputation as a savvy young coach who did whatever it took to win.

Read into that what you will, given that UC was hit with NCAA sanctions soon after he left.

Anyway, back to the point, which in this case is that when Rodriguez was hired, the school knew what it was getting. No, he didn't seem like a win-at-all-costs renegade. The school would never have gone for one of those. That would have been the kind of risk WVU had no interest in taking while making its first hire in those two sports in two decades. But a rule-stretcher? Well, maybe.

And again, the school knew what it was getting into. Which is why it watched him like a hawk.

We bring this up, of course, because Rodriguez is now tearing up at press conferences - didn't we see this once before when he was trying to convince us that his family had been threatened because he left West By God? - and defending himself and his program at Michigan over accusations that he routinely drives his players to ridiculous lengths well beyond those allowed by the NCAA. And so the natural first thought is, if it's true, did he do anything similar in seven years in Morgantown?

The answer is neither a yes nor a no. This is a gray area that is open to wide interpretation.

Know this, though: Because West Virginia knew what it was getting when it hired Rodriguez, the powers that be were careful - almost obsessive - to keep both eyes open.

That was pretty obvious when during Rodriguez's early years in Morgantown - and to an extent beyond that - former compliance director Brad Cox was a semi-regular at WVU's football practices, oftentimes with athletic director Ed Pastilong in tow. No one ever said as much, but these guys knew that a new day had dawned and they wanted to be as certain as they could be that the young coach with the drive and the obsessive nature still functioned within boundaries. Rodriguez would see Cox or Pastilong paying close attention and was probably none too thrilled that he was, in a sense, being babysat, but these guys knew that you couldn't just turn over the keys and hope the speed limit was being obeyed.

(Just as an aside and with that in mind, does it now give you a little bit of a different perspective on the now-renowned Rodriguez-Pastilong rift that the coach referred to in his post-departure comments? Especially considering that many of the particulars in that rift were over things the coach wanted and Pastilong was hesitant to grant.)

Never had the school made such an abrupt change in philosophy in one of its two major sports of football and men's basketball. Think about it.

Sure, WVU had hired new coaches that were, well, just different from the old ones. But many of the hires over the years had simply been promotions from within or guys - young or old - who were, shall we say, mainstream.

In football, Don Nehlen was as old-school as they come, having been raised on Midwestern and Big Ten football. Frank Cignetti and Bobby Bowden before him were already on staff. Jim Carlen was a Bobby Dodd disciple. Gene Corum was on Pappy Lewis' staff for 10 years and Lewis had been on the job since 1950. Should we go on?

In basketball, perhaps the closest thing to Rodriguez was actually Gale Catlett. Like Rodriguez, he was a WVU grad who had gone on to make a name for himself coaching elsewhere, at Cincinnati. When he returned, he brought with him a reputation as a savvy young coach who did whatever it took to win.

Read into that what you will, given that UC was hit with NCAA sanctions soon after he left.

Anyway, back to the point, which in this case is that when Rodriguez was hired, the school knew what it was getting. No, he didn't seem like a win-at-all-costs renegade. The school would never have gone for one of those. That would have been the kind of risk WVU had no interest in taking while making its first hire in those two sports in two decades. But a rule-stretcher? Well, maybe.

And again, the school knew what it was getting into. Which is why it watched him like a hawk.

We bring this up, of course, because Rodriguez is now tearing up at press conferences - didn't we see this once before when he was trying to convince us that his family had been threatened because he left West By God? - and defending himself and his program at Michigan over accusations that he routinely drives his players to ridiculous lengths well beyond those allowed by the NCAA. And so the natural first thought is, if it's true, did he do anything similar in seven years in Morgantown?

The answer is neither a yes nor a no. This is a gray area that is open to wide interpretation.

Know this, though: Because West Virginia knew what it was getting when it hired Rodriguez, the powers that be were careful - almost obsessive - to keep both eyes open.

That was pretty obvious when during Rodriguez's early years in Morgantown - and to an extent beyond that - former compliance director Brad Cox was a semi-regular at WVU's football practices, oftentimes with athletic director Ed Pastilong in tow. No one ever said as much, but these guys knew that a new day had dawned and they wanted to be as certain as they could be that the young coach with the drive and the obsessive nature still functioned within boundaries. Rodriguez would see Cox or Pastilong paying close attention and was probably none too thrilled that he was, in a sense, being babysat, but these guys knew that you couldn't just turn over the keys and hope the speed limit was being obeyed.

(Just as an aside and with that in mind, does it now give you a little bit of a different perspective on the now-renowned Rodriguez-Pastilong rift that the coach referred to in his post-departure comments? Especially considering that many of the particulars in that rift were over things the coach wanted and Pastilong was hesitant to grant.)

Anyway, so did it work? Well, again, it's a gray area. One man's voluntary workout is another's mandatory.

Rodriguez and his staff at Michigan are being accused of often tripling the eight-hour weekly limit for those "voluntary" summer workouts. It is alleged that Sundays after a Saturday loss at Michigan - and there were plenty of those last year - were grueling 10-hour marathons. That exceeds both the four-hour daily limit and contributes mightily to exceeding the 20-hour weekly limit for time spent on football activities.

The only current player I've managed to ask about Rodriguez's demands while he was at WVU would only say that he "never saw anything like that when [Rodriguez] was here. You knew you'd better put in the extra time or you weren't going to play, but it wasn't like they were calling us and making us come in.''

And there's nothing wrong with that, even according to the NCAA. In the offseason, for instance, a player can spend all day in the weight room if he chooses. He just can't be asked to spend more than eight hours.

Part of the problem at Michigan - and therefore the difference between that and most of Rodriguez's tenure at WVU - is that the Wolverines are not very good. Rodriguez doesn't like not-very-good and so he will push harder and harder. At West Virginia, most of his teams were good, so why push beyond the limits?

After Rodriguez's 3-8 debut season at WVU, though, perhaps there was something to that. Bob Hertzel at the Times-West Virginian in Fairmont got a quote from a former player via his Facebook page who said during and after that season "I felt we were at the stadium far more than the NCAA allowed.'' But even when talking about what he felt were long Sundays following games he said that included one or two hours of treatment for injuries (which doesn't count against the four-hour limit) and that he missed most of the 1 p.m. NFL games. That's a far cry from the 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. shifts alleged at Michigan and the argument can be made that they were within the letter of the law, if not necessarily the spirit of it.

"The rest of my days at WVU were business as usual - and acceptable to all the players,'' the former player said. "Of course, Sunday sessions at the football office were no longer implemented, in part because of the obvious displeasure among players the year before and we were winning on Saturdays.''

The bottom line is that if Rodriguez is breaking NCAA rules at Michigan, you can bet it's not cut and dried. We're not talking about, say, improper recruiting, where things like phone records or even money changing hands can be documented. There will be no smoking gun. For the most part, it's a matter of interpretation regarding what is voluntary and what isn't, what constitutes organized activities and what doesn't.

Almost immediately after the Detroit Free Press made the accusations in a Sunday story, Michigan officials said they would launch a full investigation. And if the NCAA ever gets involved, it's a pretty safe bet that questions will reach Morgantown and Pastilong's desk.

When reminded of those trips he and Cox used to make to West Virginia practices, Pastilong simply didn't want to go there. It was easy to "hear'' the smile, though. And as far as a WVU investigation to simply stay a step ahead of the issue, nothing grand is planned.

"Our compliance requirements include monthly, weekly and sometimes even daily reports and they're all in our records,'' Pastilong said. "They work in both a prevention mode and an educational mode in making sure our coaches are doing the right things. I have every confidence that during that time we were in full compliance.''

Even if it took an extra set or two of eyes to make sure.

Reach Dave Hickman at 304-348-1734 or dphickm...@aol.com.