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The Hollywood movie 28 Days chronicles the journey of a young woman who enters a rehab program to confront her addiction. As they say, the first step is acknowledging you have a problem. 

The University of Michigan may want to check out this flick to see how it's done.

The Wolverine football program, who opened their 2007 season with a shocking loss to Appalachian State in the greatest Division 1 upset of all time, entered their own 28-day rehab program on November 18, the day after they closed the regular season campaign with a book-ending defeat at the hands of arch-rival Ohio State. They emerged 29 days later with a letter of abandonment, er, intent in hand, signed by West Virginia University coach Rich Rodriguez, whose breach of the WVU contract he'd signed just last August prompted West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller to brand the action, and the participants in its consummation, "amoral." (See our recent Indie Sport post, "Commitment Issues," for an athlete-centered perspective on the fallout of this story.)

Detractors of the Wolverines are counseled to exercise patience in this matter, for a wolverine is a solitary burrowing carnivorous mammal of northern regions related to the weasel. That's not a personal characterization-- it's what the dictionary says, and who are we to argue? Twenty-eight days simply are not enough to change the nature of such a beast, so I'm recommending the 71 day program recently completed by Steve Orsini, the athletic director at SMU. 

When it comes to rehab, the Mustangs' intercollegiate athletic program is in a league of its own. Given the so-called NCAA "death penalty" in 1987 for numerous violations, such as paying players, the SMU football program was shut down by the authorities. It eventually re- emerged as a shell of its previously competitive self and has floundered in losing obscurity ever since.

Enter Steve Orsini, who began his tenure on the Hilltop in June 2006 and has been putting his imprint on the SMU sports culture ever since. On October 28 he fired head football coach Phil Bennett in the midst of a 1-11 season that played out in front of a sea of empty seats. And so began the 71 days, as Orsini embarked on his search for a transformative coach. 

By December 1 he'd identified the man for the job, June Jones, then coach of the undefeated University of Hawaii. Jones, unlike Rich Rodriguez, was in the final year of his contract and openly ambivalent about signing on for another tour in "paradise." But on December 1 the coach's focus was on the game between Hawaii and the University of Washington, the one for all the marbles. If the Warriors won, they'd complete a perfect regular season and likely receive a BCS bowl bid for the first time in history. Orsini watched as Jones and his boys clawed their way back from a 21-0 deficit and rallied to victory. His refreshing take on what that meant to him reveals the man within.

"I'm like, 'If they win they'd be the only undefeated team in the nation and our society would love to see that team get a chance to move up to a BCS bowl,' " he said, knowing that a Hawaii victory would work against SMU's self-interests, for it would extend the Warriors' season, and thus SMU's job search by  a month. A month is an eternity for college programs competing for available talent. But in the ethical world of Steve Orsini, honor matters, even when it engenders risk. Listen up, Michigan:

"One thing I said to myself was, 'I am not going to hurt the opportunities of a coach and the student-athletes at that university. Let's let them finish out the year because SMU is in this for the long run.'"

Orsini sought and received permission from Hawaii athletic director Herman Frazier to speak with Jones' agent Leigh Steinberg and on January 7, 71 days after he began his journey of a thousand miles with the proverbial single step, he signed Jones to a 5-year contract worth $10 million. Good things do indeed come to those who wait.