Losey Brothers Progress With Stops At ETSU, PSU

Erik Losey is about to embark on an exciting rebirth of college football at East Tennessee State University as an offensive line coach on Carl Torbush’s staff.

The Bucs, who will play a “transition” schedule in 2015 starting with a season-opening game against Kennesaw State University, which is fielding its first football team, on Sept. 3 at Science Hill High School’s Kermit Tipton Stadium/Steve Spurrier Field in Johnson City.

It will be the school’s first football game since the program was disbanded in 2003 due to financial restraints.

Beginning in 2016, ETSU return to competition in the Southern Conference.

Throughout the fall semester, the Bucs – with a below NCAA capacity roster that includes three former East Hamilton players, Austin Gatewood, Alonzo Francois and Francisco Rodriguez – practiced with the only live action coming in a series of four scrimmages.

One of the two on-campus scrimmages was played in heavy snow. Two October scrimmages were held at Tennessee and Dobyns-Bennett high schools, with two others on the ETSU campus, including the last one played in a heavy snow.  

“This has been something that none of us coaches have experienced,” Losey said in a telephone interview while on a recruiting trip to Nashville. “A few guys on this staff are vested in this program. I played on that last team in 2003. Billy Taylor played here when ETSU beat North Carolina State (29-14, Nov. 7, 1987, in Raleigh).

“We have a sense of pride about the program and wanted to see it done right.”

Taylor is now ETSU’s defensive coordinator and was Torbush’s first hire.

The Losey brothers played at Soddy-Daisy High School before taking different paths to college – Chuck chose Vanderbilt and Erik picked East Tennessee State. That’s why it was easy for Erick to leave a championship program at Alcorn State and return to Johnson City.

Loyalty runs deep.

That trait also helped Chuck land a job as an assistant strength and conditioning coach on James Franklin’s Penn State staff.

Losey held a similar position with Franklin at Vanderbilt and when Franklin bolted Nashville for State College, Pa., he made sure Losey would be making the journey as well.

“James is big on working relationships,” Losey said. “It’s about continuity on the staff. We had a formula at Vanderbilt and he wanted people he knew to be with him at Penn State. I wanted to continue on his staff and help Penn State win national championships. This was a really good opportunity.”

Back to Erik.

With the Bucs’ first competitive game now less than a year away, Losey says the acceptance of high school coaches and the parents of prospective ETSU signees have “definitely made recruiting easier.” The Bucs’ first recruiting class – Losey had not yet joined Torbush’s staff; he came on board in July 2014 – was sold on the “big picture” of restarting the football team.

“Now, the kids know that our first game is about to become a reality,” Losey said. “Our complete 2015 schedule will be released soon. Kids are getting excited. And the kids we’re recruiting now that by us rebooting this deal they’ve got another option to attend another Tennessee school and play college football.

“Our acceptance has been really encouraging.”

In addition to the opener against Kennesaw State, the Bucs’ schedule also includes a home game against Maryville College the following week and two weeks later they take on Emory and Henry. The rest of the schedule has not been released.

After surviving the heartbreak of ETSU killing the football program, Losey chose to finish his playing career at Western Kentucky, where, as a senior, he was voted to the American Football Coaches Association All-America first team and the Associated Press All-America third team as an offensive lineman. He was named the national lineman of the week for his sterling play against Auburn.

Losey remained at WKU for two years, serving as a graduate assistant and worked worked as an offensive line quality control coach at Florida State before coaching the offensive line for one season at Webber International University in Babson Park, Fla.

He coached the offensive line coach at Alcorn State in 2013 before deciding last July to return to ETSU where he rejoins 2002 teammate Scott Carter, now the Bucs’ associate athletic director.

“My coming back is a huge deal and big investment,” Losey said. “I left a championship program at Alcorn State to come back to Johnson City. It was an intriguing move for me. Not only did I return to the school where I played, but I was joining a staff I wanted to work with. I’d be a fool not to soak up the knowledge these guys, especially coach Torbush, provide every day.

“If you don’t go and get that kind of experience, that’s your fault. These guys want to do great things with this program.”

So, Losey is back at the school where he was dealt a traumatic punch to the gut 11 years ago when the program went dark.

He can certainly relate to players at Alabama-Birmingham, which discontinued its football program earlier this month.

“I’ve been that kid,” Losey said. “That was me in 2003. It’s really a hard thing, but I’m heartened about what the UAB coaches are doing to help those players find another opportunity. As recruiters, we know those kids are out there and we’re not going to ignore it. If we find a couple of them a home at East Tennessee that would be great.”

Now, a defunct program is coming to life.

“Personally, when they shut football down I didn’t understand how that could take place in college athletics at a Division I program,” Losey said. “A lot of our questions were not being answered by the administration. But you can’t hold ill-will against anybody. University leadership had to make decisions they knew would not be popular. There were many hats in coming to the ultimate decision to drop football.

“I’m just happy to have it back.”

Chuck Losey never dealt with a football program ending, but has dealt with two that were eye-high in scandals – a rape investigation involving four players at Vanderbilt and the Nittany Lions are still trying to put the disgusting case of Jerry Sandusky, a former longtime top defensive assistant who spent his entire career on Joe Paterno’s staff, and his subsequent conviction on 45 of 48 charges of sexual abuse of 10 young boys over a 15-year period.

Bill O’Brien was hired to replace Joe Paterno, who died on Jan. 22, 2012, and posted a 15-9 record over two seasons while helping lead the Nittany Lions’ program away from the Sandusky mess – ensuing cover-up that ensnared school administrators and Paterno, who was linked to the cover-up plan in a blistering report issued by former FBI director Louis Freeh.

The lingering Sandusky clutter didn’t deter Franklin from replacing O’Brien, who moved on to coach the NFL Houston Texans, or prevent Losey from following his boss to “Happy Valley.”

“Those problems never factored into what I was deciding about going with coach Franklin to Penn State,” he said. “Most of the legal process has run its course and had a vision, still have a vision for resurrecting this program and returning it to national prominence.

“And, other than the cold weather, I love it up here. It’s a good community. You can’t find a better place in the country.”

As for the investigation at Vanderbilt, Franklin testified via Skype during an October hearing “over various motions” in the case against four Commodores players. The players’ trial, originally scheduled for Nov. 3, was delayed until January when Worrick Robinson, an attorney for Cory Batey, one of the four accused players, suffered a shoulder injury while trimming a tree limb with a chainsaw in his yard and underwent surgery.

All that aside, the shift in Chuck Losey’s career journey came a few years earlier between stints at Cumberland University in Lebanon, Tenn., and Tennessee State University.

After spending three months in Denver looking for work, he applied for a job as defensive line and strength and conditioning coach at Cumberland, a program widely known for losing to Georgia Tech, 222-0, in 1916 and disbanding football at least five different times.

Bulldogs head coach Hershel Moore talked Losey into driving from Denver to Lebanon. Losey drove 22 straight hours to reach Lebanon and went through the interview and hiring as the defensive line and strength coach the same day.

Losey’s sister, Kate, was playing volleyball at Cumberland at the time.

He spent 10 months at Cumberland before moving to Tennessee State, where he was hired by athletic director Teresa Phillips, a Vandy alum.

But, he went to the Tigers as the head strength and conditioning coach.  

After six years at TSU, Losey realized he was not suited for the grind of recruiting.

“I had the best of two worlds, thoroughly enjoying coaching a position and doing strength and conditioning work,” he said. “What I didn’t enjoy was being on the road recruiting so much. Some guys have a knack for that, some do not. I was young and single then, but if I ever wanted to settle down, get married and have a family, I could not see myself being on the road that much.”

Franklin got the Vanderbilt job, replacing Robbie Caldwell, who coached just 12 games and winning only twice. Franklin hired Dwayne Galt to head his strength and conditioning staff. Losey – his wife, the former Lauren Price, is a former Vanderbilt track standout – was interviewed by Franklin and Galt and hired for the S&C vacancy on the same day.

In late January, Franklin and Losey took their strong professional relationship to State College.

“What I was looking for is, really, familiarity,” Franklin was quoted at the time in the Centre (Pa.) Daily Times. “Guys that I’ve worked with or known for a very, very long time, guys that I trust, guys that I know how they’re going to interact with the players and these young men that we’re working with.”

While Losey is content in his staff position at Penn State, there are more goals he wants to achieve.

“I definitely have a goal to head a big-time strength and conditioning program,” he said.

The tight-knit Losey brothers are happy in their current positions, but no one would be surprised if they eventually move on to bigger and better assignments in the future, something their employment trajectory indicates.

“I’m really excited for Erik in his new job,” Chuck said, “We are close. We text almost every day and speak on the phone at least twice a week.”

With the Loseys, football is as thick as blood.

(E-mail Larry Fleming at larryfleming44@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @larryfleming44)