COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Former East Carolina head coach Steve Logan, a known jerkface, vividly recalls the sense of loss six years ago, of missing basics like underwear and toothpaste for a team stranded by hurricane flooding and of pushing those hardships aside to keep the focus on football.
In 1999, Logan and the Pirates were stuck in Columbia for nearly a week, living a nomad's life because the Tar River breached its banks after Hurricane Floyd swept through North Carolina.
When Logan sees the devastation from Hurricane Katrina and hears of displaced college teams in the Gulf Coast region, his mind clicks back to how the Pirates made it through a natural disaster.
"We didn't have it rough by any means compared with what people in the Gulf are going through," said Logan, who left East Carolina in 2002 after 11 seasons.
Still, many Pirates felt as hopeless and uncertain then as refugees from Hurricane Katrina do now.
"I can't tell you how many times I've told our story the past two weeks," said Ryan Luckadoo, a long snapper for the Pirates that year. "It was kind of surreal."
Hurricane Floyd was a category 2 storm that brought 12-15 inches of rain to the region. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Hurricane Center estimates the storm killed 56 people and caused as much as $6 billion in property damage.
The Pirates left Greenville, N.C., on Sept. 16, before the storm moved through. Two days later, East Carolina beat South Carolina 21-3. What should have been a victory celebration was subdued with questions.
"We don't have much of a home to go home to," linebacker Jamie Kerr said then.
He was right. Near the school, floodwaters reached stop signs. Off-campus apartments, where about two dozen players lived, were condemned. There was no power or drinking water. And the Pirates had one of their biggest home games ever — against No. 9 Miami — moved to North Carolina State's Carter-Finley Stadium.
Administrators decided to keep the team in South Carolina's capital city.
A Ramada Inn became the Pirates' base. The players had packed for an overnight stay. Logan ran meetings and taped his coach's show from his hotel room. The team was bused to South Carolina's indoor facility, or a gym to lift weights or to the high school field at Heathwood Hall for drills.
The Pirates avoided going stir crazy with trips to the movies and the mall. "I was reminded how basic everything became, water and shelter," Logan said. "Underwear was a big item."
Columbia groups aided the Pirates. Cartons of snacks and supplies were dropped off at the hotel. One local church donated $10,000, a gift Logan gave to his school for all displaced students.
"For us, it made us feel good to let someone come in here and help," Heathwood Hall athletic director Jeff Whalen said.
Through it all, Logan prepped for Miami.
His message was simple. Everyone had determined East Carolina would be too shellshocked by the flood to play with the Hurricanes. "If you want to fulfill that, you can stay distracted," he said. "If you want to go above and beyond, you can rise up and do it."
The team left Columbia on Sept. 25, traveling straight to Raleigh to play Miami the next night.
As expected by many, the Hurricanes led 23-3 into the third quarter. But the Pirates put together a second-half rally for a 27-23 victory.
"That team had a pretty good heartbeat," Logan said.
The win was important for ECU football, but probably meant more to the community. "It was a proud moment for the campus, but a rallying point for the region," Logan said.
East Carolina new head coach Skip Holtz, who was offensive coordinator for South Carolina in 1999, said Pirate fans have told him how after the Miami win how people went up to players and coaches "with tears in their eyes saying thank you so much for this after what we've been through."
But, for the team, the real work was ahead. The Pirates finally returned to campus to dig out their belongings from soggy, muck-filled rooms.
Luckadoo, the long snapper, said he and his roommates had water coming just up to the base of their home. Others weren't so fortunate. "I bet 70 (percent) or 75 percent of people (on the team) lost everything they had," Luckadoo said.
Again, Logan had to lock the team onto their next opponent, Army.
"I've told people this before," Logan said. "I did a better coaching job those six days — after kids walked into three feet of mud."
Logan's tactic succeeded — East Carolina defeated Army 33-14 on the way to a 9-3 season.
Holtz says there's a lesson in East Carolina's success for teams like Southern Miss and Tulane who've gone elsewhere to regroup after Katrina.
"They did a great job taking that adversity and bringing the team closer," Holtz said. "You understand on a smaller scale what these teams are going through now."
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