Mac's back: McBride happy to be home in Utah at Weber State

Coaches can have several reasons for changing jobs: money, prestige or just finding work again after being fired.

Weber State University coach Ron McBride has his heart.

The middle-of-the-night heart attack that the longtime University of Utah coach had on Oct. 6, 2004, in Lexington, Ky. — where he was in his second season as University of Kentucky linebackers coach — essentially convinced McBride he should follow his heart back "home."

"That was really a wake-up call for me to say, 'OK, find out what your priorities are,' " McBride recalled recently, between Weber-benefit golf outings and a busy spring recruiting schedule.

"I knew after that I still wanted to coach, but I also knew I wanted to get back to where my family is and where I enjoyed being.

"Not that I didn't enjoy being in Kentucky," he added quickly, grateful to coach Rich Brooks for letting him stay in coaching after being fired in November 2002 by Utah after 13 years as its head coach and some 25 years on the Ute staff. "Just, Kentucky is not my home."

After such a long time in Utah — he first came as part of Wayne Howard's staff starting in 1977 — the native Californian realized soon after surviving his heart attack that he wanted to be back in the Beehive State.

Even before McBride's heart attack, last summer, he and wife Vicky bought another home in the Salt Lake Valley, one that they planned to retire to. They moved much of their furniture back to Utah, planning to rent furnishings in Kentucky in the interim.

And he inquired about the then-vacant Weber State athletic director's position.

The heart attack sharpened his desire.

"What I wanted to do, if I could, was come back to Utah, coach somewhere in the state of Utah and be someplace where I feel real comfortable," McBride said.

"Lexington is a pretty town, great fans, great league (Southeast Conference). Probably if I was 35," said the 65-year-old, "it would have been the best thing I could have ever done. But at this point of my career, if I could, I wanted to come back."

He also wanted to sort of relive his past, be the top man again and reinvent another football program.

"Yeah, once you've been a head coach, once you've called the shots, it's a little harder to be in a system," he said. "There's certain things you like to do.