Shakeup in the ACC brings some familiar faces home.(Brief Article)

Somewhere in Maryland, Ralph Friedgen is sitting in a Pizza Hut. He's taking a break from the recruiting trail and wants something to eat--salad, no pizza. But he can't sit and talk long. Maryland's new coach is busy building his team, one that might take the Terrapins to their first bowl since 1990. The job is a dream come true for Friedgen. Maryland is his school--class of 1969. This is his first shot at being a head coach, and he's eating it up.

"Maybe the best thing about the job is the location," he says. "We can go five hours in any direction and get all the football players we want with good grades. It's one of the 10 largest universities in the country, so the flexibility with our curriculum helps. There's a lot to sell. It's going be a real force, I believe."

Friedgen, formerly Georgia Tech's offensive coordinator, isn't alone in adapting to a new job. This was a tumultuous offseason for coaches, with 23 changes made in the I-A ranks--the most since 24 hires were made after the 1996 season. Four of nine schools in the ACC changed head coaches--a higher percentage of turnover than any other conference. Four of the MAC's 13 schools--Buffalo, Bowling Green, Toledo and Ohio--made moves.

The last league to experience an overhaul similar to the ACC's was the Big Ten. Illinois (Ron Turner), Indiana (Cam Cameron), Minnesota (Glen Mason) and Purdue (Joe Tiller) made changes after the 1996 season. Half of the Big Eight's schools made changes after the 1994 season: Oklahoma (Howard Schnellenberger), Oklahoma State (Bob Simmons), Iowa State (Dan McCarney) and Colorado (Rick Neuheisel).

In the ACC, former New Orleans Saints assistant John Bunting has taken over at North Carolina, former Ohio coach Jim Grobe at Wake Forest and former New York Jets coach Al Groh at Virginia. Like Friedgen, Groh and Bunting are back at their alma maters.

"When you hire somebody from your school, you have a familiarity with the school," Friedgen says. "It's not like you are coming in from the outside and have to learn a lot about the school. I think that transition helps quite a bit. The only thing you have to worry about are the skeletons in your closet."

Friedgen laughs at that thought. He laughs often, which is part of his appeal, and he makes the game fun, apparent by the passing attacks he developed at Georgia Tech. He doesn't have the personnel at Maryland that he had with the Yellow Jackets, but he has a plan.