Rejecting Florida offer not an easy choice for Gillespie

For four seasons, Robert Gillespie was a mainstay in the backfield at the University of Florida.

In his time playing for Hall of Fame head coach Steve Spurrier, Gillespie accounted for more than 3,000 yards of offense and scored 20 touchdowns.

Just a month after accepting the job as West Virginia's running game coordinator, the young assistant was faced with the difficult challenge of choosing between his brand new job and a gig at his alma mater.

Gillespie was offered a job with the Gators under new head coach Will Muschamp. But the 31-year-old announced on Feb. 2 that he is sticking with his choice to coach at WVU.

"I'm a man of my word," Gillespie said. "I left a good job at Oklahoma State to come here with (offensive coordinator and head coach-in-waiting Dana Holgorsen), and I gave him my word that I would help him build this program.

"(Florida's) a place that holds a special place in my heart, but I didn't make a decision based off of emotions."

Gillespie relied heavily on the advice of his wife, Crystal, who he said was the most supportive of him throughout the process of Florida courting him.

"Immediately, I contacted her and we talked about it and prayed about it," Gillespie said. "We just felt that it wasn't the right time for me, my career and my goals."

A lot of that decision to stay at West Virginia also came from the great relationship that Gillespie has formed over the past year with Holgorsen. They worked together for the first time last season at Oklahoma State when Gillespie took over as the running backs coach.

It was in that year that Gillespie saw the character of the bright offensive mind and that he stands for the same things Gillespie does on the football field, as well as off of it.

"He believes that football is fun," Gillespie said. "We want to coach these kids hard, but we want them to have fun.

"When you look at different teams on the football field on Saturdays, you can tell that that kid's having fun. That's what I feel like we have here, and that's the culture that Dana wants to have around here."

Of the three new position coaches that followed Holgorsen to Morgantown this year, Gillespie is the only one that Holgorsen hadn't formed a long-time relationship with. Offensive line coach Bill Bedenbaugh played with WVU's newly appointed offensive coordinator at Iowa Wesleyan before coaching with him at Texas Tech.

Holgorsen was the quarterbacks and receivers coach at Wingate when inside receivers coach Shannon Dawson played there in 1999.

But even though the rest of the new additions to the staff have already spent quite a few years together, Gillespie doesn't think it'll take too long before the group gets accustomed to "the new guy."

"I'm excited that coach Holgorsen wanted me to come join this group of guys that he had been with for a long time," Gillespie said. "That's one of the reasons why I wanted to come here. I knew I'd be working with a bunch of bright-minded, young offensive coaches that I could grow with."

Holgorsen said he wasn't surprised by the Florida offer and said he expects Gillespie to receive many more chances to advance his career in the future.

"He's going to have lots of opportunities in the very near future to be able to go to a lot of different places," Holgorsen said. "His career is extremely, extremely young, so he's going to have lots of opportunities. (His situation) was tough, but we think we've got a pretty good deal here, too."

Gillespie agreed.

"Doors open sometimes when you don't expect them to, and if it's meant to be, it'll open back up," he said. "But right now, I'm a West Virginia Mountaineer, and I'm excited about that."