London maintains fast, furious schedule

When Mike London was introduced as Virginia’s new head football coach a week-and-a-half ago, he described his hiring as a whirlwind experience.
In a mere three days, he watched his University of Richmond team lose in the final minutes of the FCS playoffs to being officially offered the UVa job, to being introduced as the new Cavaliers’ coach.
If he thought that was whirlwind, then I don’t know how he would describe his first 10 days on the job.
We caught up with London on Tuesday night in Richmond, just before he hit the recruiting trail for the rest of this week as he attempts to lure more talent toward Charlottesville.
So, what has the Cavaliers’ boss been doing his first week or so on the job?
How about this for an itinerary: had personal interviews with every player on Virginia’s roster; hired four assistant coaches; took in some state high school championship games; contacted the school’s 11 committed recruits; chatted with Hall of Famer George Welsh; and hit the road to recruit.
Oh, yes, and managed to spend some time with his family back in Richmond.
Meeting the team
The UVa players were his top priority. He scheduled personal interviews with every Cavalier player in his office, so he could get to know those that he hadn’t met while serving as Virginia’s defensive coordinator prior to taking the UR job in 2008.
He not only wanted to get to know them, but to explain his expectations of them before they went home for Christmas, so that when they return, they will know what they’re going to face in offseason training.
London also wanted to talk to them about respect and understanding what it will take to restore Virginia as a winning program. Part of that will be a history lesson.
“Who’s Chris Slade? Who’s Shawn Moore? Who’s Herman Moore?” London said. “You guys need to know who those people are, you need to know and understand the history of this place.”
A bit of history
While London has served two coaching stints here under Al Groh, he didn’t mind getting a bit of a history lesson himself on Tuesday from the guy who wrote most of UVa’s success: George Welsh. The Hall of Fame coach still maintains an office in University Hall and dropped by to welcome London back to the program.
“We spent about half an hour just talking about football, staff, people, recruiting, a lot of things,” London said of the conversation.
“Why wouldn’t I embrace Coach Welsh? It was like, ‘Just come on in Coach and tell me how did you do it?’ I mean, 19 years ... if I could just stay [at UVa] half that long.”
Welsh coached UVa, previously the Sad Sack of college football, to national prominence during his 19-year career as captain of the Good Ship Wahoo.
The man who built Virginia football had some good advice for the new coach.
“He told me to be myself,” London said. “Don’t try to change because people want you to change.”
London recounted the national championship game last year when Richmond won the FCS title and showed more emotion than some seemed to accept. He got a little criticism for his outburst of passion.
“I remember somebody was saying at the championship game — I was jumping up and down — to act like you’ve been there,” London said. “Well, that was the problem. I hadn’t been there. I guess there’s a Head Coaching Etiquette Book 101 that says ‘head coaches shall not jump up and down.’”
London said that Welsh also told him to surround himself with good people when it came to assembling a staff, something he will continue to do as the month progresses. Speculation is that former UR head coach Jim Reid, now a linebackers coach for the Miami Dolphins, will be his choice as UVa’s new defensive coordinator, and that Atlanta Falcons quarterback coach Bill Musgrave could be his top choice for the offensive coordinator’s job, although some are hoping that former UVa coordinator Gregg Brandon will get an interview.
Brandon has always contended that his spread offense would have worked at Virginia given time (it hasn’t been an instant transition at Michigan under Rich Rodriguez), and that given the appropriate quarterback, magical things could happen at UVa, where perhaps an offense just a little bit abnormal would help.
London said he will stress academics to his players and that going to class and turning in class assignments on time are just as important to him as carrying out assignments on the practice and playing fields.
True to his word, the new Virginia coach’s first recruiting trip was back home, to the “757” on Wednesday, where he was invited to speak at a Virginia High School League clinic, something he quickly accepted.
“We want to be welcome in the Tidewater because the Tidewater is welcome at our place,” London said.
It was the first stop in three days of planned recruiting, so don’t expect him to sit still very long. London has a lot of work to do.