When Rich Miano showed up to check out a jersey at the University of Hawaii equipment room before the start of football practice in 1980 they had but one question for him:

“Who are you, again?”

When he left the program this week amid the staff changeover, the public’s shock of the separation — what, no more Miano?— had become the stuff of bold headlines, buzzing radio talk shows and frenzied Internet sites.

In between Miano had, in a lot of people’s minds, come to personify the Warrior football spirit while being an inspiration to decades of overlooked and unrecruited players.

Here was a walk-on from the 1979 Prep Bowl champion Kaiser High team begrudgingly given a tryout who went on, through force of determination and unrelenting work ethic, to become a two-time All-Western Athletic Conference pick at safety, a sixth-round draft pick and an 11-year NFL veteran.

Since then, in what had become an 18-year stay, Miano has not only been an articulate advocate for walk-ons at UH but, through camps and clinics, has shown hundreds of youngsters the way to reach for their dreams.

Make no mistake about it, Norm Chow emerged from the list of announced candidates as the best choice for the UH job. And with the position comes the authority for Chow to name his own coaching staff. It is the way the business goes, just as Miano would have been entrusted to make the calls had he been selected to succeed Greg McMackin.

A big part of the difference in their standing was timing. Had McMackin “retired” after a 12-2 season, Miano, as the Warriors’ associate head coach, would have been viewed as a likely successor. But coming off a 6-7 finish the perception was different.

Fair or not, like a vice president, you can rise or fall on the results of your leader, even if the policies that got you there might not be of your own making. Though it would have been good had Miano had an opportunity to share his vision.

More than a quarter-century spent in college and the pros has taught Miano that it rarely works out that way, which was why you didn’t hear from him the pain he must have felt.

It would not be the first time Miano was pigeonholed at UH by circumstance. When he emerged as a starting strong safety in 1982 after a season on the scout team and a redshirt year, it took a while for some fans to realize that the name was “Miano” of Italian heritage — not “Miyano” and of Japanese ancestry.

By any name Miano, the one-time championship diver, brought passion and pride to UH. He was all-out whether it was leading the team in tackles in 1983 or hitting the road for recruits as an assistant coach.

One day and in some way you’d like to think Miano will find his way back to UH. The better for the both of them.

And when that times comes, nobody will have to ask, “Who are you, again?”

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.