Pitt's Charlie Partridge, N.C. State's Dave Doeren hit the road, learned to coach

At the Wormy Dog Saloon in Stillwater, Okla., you could listen to top country bands and, according to its Facebook page, have “a rowdy good time.”

But that’s not what young Drake football coaches Charlie Partridge, Dave Doeren and Chris Ash were chasing in the late 1990s as they rolled out of Iowa and up and down Interstate 35.

“We were junkies for football,” Doeren said.

All that stood in the way of the three graduate assistants were gasoline prices and several hundred miles of I-35, the highway that runs from Duluth, Minn., through Iowa, almost to the Mexican border in Laredo, Texas. They didn’t make it to Mexico but close.

“Our spring breaks, we would pick a highway,” said Partridge, now Pitt’s assistant head coach/defensive line who will be in Heinz Field on Saturday to meet Doeren’s N.C. State Wolfpack. “We picked I-35 one year, and we figured out who was in spring ball and would cold call the office and say, ‘Can we come and watch practice and sit in on as many meetings as you’ll let us sit on?’ We were just hungry to learn.

“We were having a ton of fun the same way anybody in their early 20s would have fun.”

Drake didn’t hold spring drills, so the three of them spent three springs talking ball with any coach willing to answer questions.

“We just had this weird, unique connection where we were always trying to get everything we could from any coach who would let us talk to him,” Partridge said. “We were always wired that way. We fed off each other.”

Name a school that sits in the Great Plains or Texas, and chances are Partridge, Doeren and Ash stopped there, ready to fill up their notebooks with as much football knowledge as they could acquire.

“Whether we were going to Nebraska or going to Kansas State or Oklahoma or Oklahoma State or TCU,” Doeren said, “we just went school to school and (met with) who would let us in the doors.

“At night, trying to find a place where you could get a cheap beer and hang out. My cousin owned a country bar in Stillwater. We had some fun down there. If we could find a free place to stay, we were all over it.”

Along the way, they met some friendly people and some not so accommodating.

“Phil Bennett took care of us,” Doeren said, referencing TCU’s defensive coordinator at the time. Partridge later served on the same Pitt staff with Bennett under Dave Wannstedt.

“Tom Osborne at Nebraska, Bill Snyder at Kansas State, some really good coaches who opened their doors to us and allowed us to learn,” Doeren said.

They also sat with Clemson defensive coordinator Brett Venables when he was at Kansas State and the Ryan brothers — Rex and Rob — when they were at Oklahoma and Oklahoma State.

But the trio didn’t just learn how to run a practice or when to call a blitz.

“The other part of it is you learn how to treat people on trips like that,” Doeren said. “There were some coaches who won’t give guys like we were the time of day, big-time you. And there are others who treat you like their sons, you know.

“You learn how to help people grow in the business, and you also learned what not to do, watching some of the guys who thought they were better than everybody.”

All three have come a long way since, rising in the profession to become head coaches. Partridge was at Florida Atlantic in his native state from 2014-16 and Ash at Rutgers from 2016-19. These days, Ash is the defensive coordinator at Texas.

They used to do everything together — even cutting grass in Des Moines, Iowa — but they worked on the same staff only one other time. They were on the Wisconsin staff in 2010 where former Pitt coach Paul Chryst was their offensive coordinator. There, they lived in the same neighborhood, and their families and children built friendships that stand today.

“Charlie’s a guy who’s not just a friend or a colleague. He’s like a brother to me,” Doeren said. “As a coach, I think he’s one of the best, too.

“What he’s done with that defensive line (at Pitt), what he did with our defensive line at Wisconsin.

“I think he’s very, very good at what he does. He’ll continue to do great things at Pittsburgh or wherever he ends up down the road.”

Said Partridge of Doeren: “He’s a driven human being. You knew Dave was going to get that shot. He had that ability to talk to people, combined with that ability to stay focused and so much attention to detail.

“He made me better, and I know he’s going to have his team ready this week.”

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