CBS Sports: "Boise State's Petersen divulges secrets to Broncos' success"

Success has come at extraordinary levels for Boise State head football coach Chris Petersen during his seven years guiding the program, according to Broncosports.com. Petersen is the winningest active coach in the Football Bowl Subdivision, boasting an 84-8 record (.913) since taking over as head coach of the Broncos in 2006.

The Broncos have won 10-or-more games in each of his seven seasons, the longest active streak in the country. Included were 12-or-more wins in four-consecutive years (2008-11), the only school to accomplish the feat since 1900.

Earlier this week at Mountain West Media Day in Las Vegas, Bruce Feldman, Senior College Football Columnist with CBS Sports, sat down with Petersen over lunch and discussed his thoughts on developing players, how much he reads and his future.


Here is an excerpt from the interview:

Q: I heard you reference something a few minutes ago. How would you categorize 'Our Way?'

Petersen: I look at it as like The Matrix. There is not any one thing. It's everything. The type of kid we recruit. The culture of our staff. Different themes that run throughout our program that I think really make a difference. From simple things like our 3.0 (GPA) board. We had 61 guys on our team on it last year. To me, that is a big thing. We emphasize it and guys are competitive. We've found that our best students are usually our best players. Those guys who are really focused on football are focused in the classroom. It translates into them taking care of their business off the field as well as on the field.

We have a whole Pyramid of Success that we've obviously based off of John Wooden's and put a different spin on. It has behaviors and values and some goals on it. That's always been our teaching model. We have different themes that we continually bang on, but there isn't any one thing. It's all these things and how they integrate.

Boise State head football coach Chris Petersen

The Broncos have won five conference championships under "Coach Pete" - four in the Western Athletic Conference (2006, 2008-10), and one in the Mountain West (2012). In conference games, Petersen's two-year record in the Mountain West is 13-2 (.867). The Broncos went 38-2 (.950) in the WAC during his first five years as head coach at Boise State.

Boise State has been to a postseason bowl game in each year under Petersen (5-2), and boasts a streak of four-straight bowl victories. The Broncos won the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl following the 2006 and 2009 seasons, and the MAACO Bowl Las Vegas in 2010, 2011 and 2012.

Each Tostitos Fiesta Bowl victory capped undefeated seasons for the Broncos, who went 13-0 in 2006 and 14-0 in 2009. Petersen was named Paul "Bear" Bryant National Coach of the Year following each season, the only head coach to win the award multiple times.

Following the 2010 season, Petersen was unanimously selected as the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year, awarded annually to a coach who represents the highest ideals both on and off the field.
In addition to winning the Bear Bryant Award in 2006, Petersen was a finalist for the 2006 Eddie Robinson Coach of the Year Award, a semifinalist for the George Munger Coach of the Year Award and was named the Region 4 Coach of the Year by the American Football Coaches Association. He was a finalist for the Liberty Mutual and Eddie Robinson Awards in 2008, and for the Joseph V. Paterno Award in 2010.

He was also named WAC Coach of the Year in both 2008 and 2009.