Cougars don't stray for new coach.

Byline: From Register-Guard and news service reports

Washington State wasted little time picking a successor to Alabama-bound Mike Price, naming longtime assistant Bill Doba head coach of the No. 7 Cougars on Wednesday.

``We didn't have to go farther than across the street from Mike Price's house,'' WSU athletic director Jim Sterk said. Doba, 62, who had been defensive coordinator since 1994, was among the first assistants Price hired when he arrived at WSU in 1989.

``This is the dream of a lifetime,'' said Doba, who admitted he had given up hope that he would ever be a college head coach. ``I want to maintain and improve the status coach Price brought this program to.''

``I think it's every coach's dream to be able to walk into a kid's home and offer a scholarship,'' Doba added.

Sterk said he hoped to complete contract negotiations with Doba within the next week. Price made a base salary of $600,000 a year in a rollover contract that will pay him an additional $300,000 this season with incentives.

Doba's selection was well-received by Cougars players and fans still smarting from Price's departure, made public less than 24 hours earlier. Price's resignation is effective Jan. 1, meaning he will coach the Cougars (10-2) in the Rose Bowl against No. 8 Oklahoma.

``It's a good fit,'' linebacker Mawuli Davis said. ``Bill Doba gets the opportunity and the experience to be a head coach. He's an excellent guy.''

Sterk said Doba was ``the first person I thought of'' when Price told him Tuesday he would be leaving for Alabama. WSU President V. Lane Rawlins said it ``took me about a minute and a half'' to endorse the selection.

``He understands the game of football and will continue what will become a winning tradition,'' Rawlins said. ``I never thought I'd say that about Cougar football.''

Doba said offensive coordinator Mike Levenseller will remain at Washington State. He said he will talk with other assistants.

Doba said he has asked the assistant coaches to give him a decision by Friday.

MOVES: Three football coaches with connections to Oregon State have secured new jobs, it was announced on Wednesday.

Brady Hoke, a defensive line (1989, 1991-94) and linebackers (1990) coach at OSU, was appointed the head coach at Ball State, where he was a four-year letterman from 1977-80.

Steve Kragthorpe, the son of former OSU coach Dave Kragthorpe, who was a graduate assistant for the Beavers (1988-89), was named the head coach at Tulsa.

Bronco Mendenhall, who played his college football at OSU and was a graduate assistant (1990), defensive line coach (1995) and defensive coordinator (1996) for the Beavers, was named defensive coordinator at Brigham Young.

Hoke, 44, has been an assistant coach at Michigan the past eight years. Kragthorpe, 37, has spent the past two seasons as the quarterbacks coach for the NFL's Buffalo Bills. Mendenhall, 36, has been the defensive coordinator at New Mexico since 1998 under head coach Rocky Long, a former defensive coordinator at OSU (1991-95).

GMAC BOWL: Byron Leftwich threw four touchdown passes in his final game to lead Marshall to a 38-15 victory over Louisville (7-6) in the GMAC Bowl on Wednesday night in Mobile, Ala.

Marshall (11-2) won a bowl game for the fifth consecutive year, the longest such streak in the nation. Top-ranked Miami has won four straight.

Leftwich became the first player in Division I-A history to throw four touchdown passes in two bowl games.

Louisville got inside the Marshall 30 just twice and went 0-for-13 on third downs.