CORVALLIS -- To occupy the long hours spent on planes during the winter's recruiting stretch run, Gary Andersen thumbed through a book called "Legacy."

The Oregon State coach is the first to acknowledge he's usually not much of a reader. And he honestly can't remember who first recommended the book by James Kerr that uses the legendary New Zealand rugby team, the All Blacks, to teach lessons about "the business of life."

Yet Andersen found himself sorting through the immediate aftermath of what he freely calls the most difficult season of his career, a 2-10 debut in Corvallis that included an 0-9 mark in Pac-12 play.

Now Andersen's copy of "Legacy" has folded pages and highlighted passages, following two complete read-throughs. A separate notebook is filled with buzzwords and motivational phrases that have manifested inside OSU's Valley Football Center in the form of dog tags and player-designed logos and rallying cries of positional pride.

So far, Andersen believes the book has delivered on its promised message. It's helped him create a plan, one the coach has simply called "Culture Change," that marks the next step in the Beavers' rebuild.

"Is it the answer to winning games? I'm not saying that," Andersen said. "But I think it's the answer to helping us grow as a team."

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Andersen looks back at the days leading up to the Civil War -- when the Beavers traveled to Autzen Stadium with fewer than 60 players, even though they were allowed to bring the full roster -- as when the program hit "rock bottom" in 2015.

He frankly characterized the group as selfish and delusional in their daily habits and expectations. But he also looked in the mirror.

"I had to do everything I could to try to get this ship to start to rise," Andersen said. "That started to turn the crank for me, just saying, 'How are we gonna figure this out?'"

So he turned to "Legacy," a book Andersen asked wife Stacey to order a couple weeks prior. As a coach, Andersen already had great respect for the All Blacks' dominance as statistically the best sports team in history. But he had not been aware of the fallout about 10 years ago, after a poor showing in the 2003 World Cup sparked unprecedented losses and turmoil within the organization.

"I was 25 pages into it and I'm like, 'Oh my God, this is right where we are,'" Andersen recalled. "And it wasn't something that was made up. I knew the names in it. I could relate to some of the dudes and what they were going through.

"It was easy for me to keep going and believe in it."

The OSU defensive line's emblem.

The basic principles like leadership, accountability and unity that then-first-year All Blacks coach Graham Henry emphasized to rejuvenate the team's culture -- and then, its on-field performance -- resonated with Andersen.

So he started taking notes and folding pages and highlighting. Then he started typing out his own plan that he kept to himself over the holiday break. He first presented his ideas to the rest of the staff upon their return from winter break, then to the players during a meeting that lasted more than 90 minutes.

It was a departure from Andersen's usual approach when installing new philosophies.

"This was really one of the few times where it was like, I don't need anybody to stamp this," Andersen said. "This is what we're doing. If you don't like it, tough."

Andersen introduced phrases like "sweep the shed" to illustrate that no one is too big to clean the floor, carry a meal tray or respect a common area. Or "live in the hard" to zoom in on the year-round difficulty of playing in a loaded Pac-12 and balancing life as a student-athlete. He stressed limiting negativity and policing one another. He handed out dog tags with the message "leave your number in a better place."

Then, each position group was tasked with creating an identity, complete with an emblem and nickname. The quarterbacks, for instance, are the Elite Generals. The outside linebackers: Boundary Hunters. The offensive linemen: Team Punishment.

Those emblems are now proudly displayed in meeting rooms and on charts detailing the performance of each player and position group in winter conditioning sessions and spring practices. They complement additions to the practice helmets, where players have been collecting stickers to highlight accomplishments in football, the weight room and community service. Friendly trash talk and celebrations often now include the position group's mantra.

"Once you get that logo, you have to live by that logo," said Treston Decoud, whose cornerbacks group is called the "Jack Boys," a slang term for thieves that describes the secondary's desire to snatch the football out of the air and away from the opposing offense.

When Andersen glances up from the desk in his office, he can also see all the position-group emblems on a giant poster. But they all surround the Beavers logo, a reminder that each combines to benefit the entire team.

"Coach A does everything for a reason," cornerback Kendall Hill said. "There's a method behind his madness when he does something. You may not see it at that given moment in time, but it will reveal itself."

The OSU quarterbacks' emblem.

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As spring practice winds down, Andersen knows this Culture Change is just beginning.

After all, identifying a change is needed and then constructing the plan to make that change are the easy steps. Sustaining that change is the challenge, particularly during the summer months.

Andersen also knows tricks like dog tags and player-designed logos won't magically fix last season's 2-10 mark or that the Beavers have lost 21 of their last 23 Pac-12 games dating back to the 2013 season.

Yet Andersen insists he loves his job and has "never been more driven." He believes in this next step, where OSU is rebuilding from within.

And just before walking off the practice field Thursday, Andersen again seamlessly slipped in another phrase from "Legacy."

"I'm gonna live in the hard, just like I ask them to," Andersen said. "And I'm gonna wake up tomorrow and grind another day."

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