Marsden a pioneer for gymnastics

Greg Marsden isn't merely the most successful coach in college gymnastics. He's John Wooden, Knute Rockne and Bill Veeck all rolled into one. He didn't invent gymnastics, but he pretty much invented the college version of it.

Three decades ago, he decided to start treating gymnastics like, well, a sport. He brought a bit of everything to the game, from athlete introductions, strength training, nutritionists and sports psychologists, to nationwide recruiting and cutting the length of competitions down to a fan-friendly two hours. He brought promotions and loud music and cheerleaders and the pep band to the quiet, golf-like world of the sport, and made it OK for fans to cheer. And through his promotional savvy, Marsden packed the stands with thousands of fans.

He made it an event.

Now everybody's doing it.

And it has cost Marsden. He has won 10 national championships, but not a single one since 1995. As the Utes head to the West Region finals this week, they are not the favorites, as they once were on an annual basis.

Marsden's associates grumble that the Utes might still have the nation's dominant program if he hadn't shared all his secrets. When coaches, athletic directors, events managers and marketing directors began showing up on the Utah campus to see how he had made gymnastics a revenue-producing sport and how he had packed the stands with 10,000 fans, he told them everything. He even showed them the plans of his state-of-the-art gymnastics facilities, facsimiles of which began popping up around the country.

Marsden was ahead of his time, and then he helped everyone catch up.

What's good for the sport is good for everyone, he reasons.

At 56, he's been coaching for more than half of his life — 32 years, or three years longer than the LaVell Edwards served as BYU's head football coach. That's three decades of 12-hour days and more than 1,000 competitions. He's hugged more young women returning from the runway than Bert Parks.

He has a won-loss record of 859-151-5; the runner-up for career wins is Georgia's Suzanne Yoculan, at 742. Under Marsden, the Utes are the only team ever to qualify for all 25 NCAA championship finals.

He still starts his days at 5:30 a.m. and gets home between 6 and 8 p.m. That's because he does the work of three men — video, travel, promotions, scheduling, community service, compliance, recruiting, practice.

"He's not standing still," says Ute sports information director Liz Abel. To combat the Utes' isolation from the big TV markets, which give his rivals an advantage, Marsden started a multimedia Web site. After every meet, he personally posts video clips and photos of his team's performances, sometimes staying up as late as 4 a.m. to complete the task.