WACO, Texas -- Fired Baylor coach Kevin Steele said the shrinking time frame he was given to turn around the program made his job virtually impossible to complete.

"To turn around a program and build a program pretty much from the depths in 3½ years is difficult to do,'' Steele said Monday, a day after he was fired. "I was very disappointed in the demands and the allotted time frame.''

Steele will coach the final three games of his fourth season, starting Saturday at Texas. The Bears (3-6, 1-4, Big 12) then play No. 1 Oklahoma and Oklahoma State.

While Steele didn't elaborate on those demands, he knows ``we certainly needed to win more football games.''

Steele is 9-33 overall and the Bears have won just one of his 29 Big 12 games. Steele reportedly has at least two seasons left on his contract, but the only private school in the conference refuses to release or confirm contract details.

"It's tough. It's a process, and it takes time,'' Steele said during the weekly Big 12 coaches teleconference, his first public comments since the firing. "I'm very proud that we are leaving it better than we got it.''

Dave Roberts, the coach Steele replaced, was just 4-18 in his two seasons. Baylor hasn't had a winning season since 1995.

Athletic director Tom Stanton, who plans to begin the search for Steele's successor in the upcoming weeks, was hospitalized Monday because of an atrial flutter in his heart. School officials said that the 51-year-old Stanton was expected to undergo a minor corrective procedure Tuesday but could be back to work by the end of the week.

The pressure has been mounting on Stanton and other school administrators since a season-opening 70-22 loss at California in which the Bears trailed 35-0 in the first quarter. Disgruntled alumni paid to have a plane fly a banner over the stadium during a home game with anti-Steele sentiments, and followed that with newspaper ads.

Still, Stanton, school president Robert B. Sloan Jr., and the school's Board of Regents had indicated that Steele's status wouldn't be addressed until after the season.

But Stanton didn't wait any longer after a 62-11 loss Saturday at Texas Tech. That was the fourth straight loss for the Bears -- a stretch in which they were outscored 181-21 -- since breaking their 29-game Big 12 losing streak with a 35-32 win over Kansas on Oct. 5.

Steele hopes that by finishing out the season he can prove to the players that they aren't the reason he got fired.

"Me being fired isn't an indictment on them. It's not their fault, they didn't cause this,'' he said. "We're not going to lose our class and integrity. I'm going to make sure they understand it's not an indictment on them.''

Players contacted on the Waco campus Monday expressed shock and disappointment, but none would comment publicly.

Stanton said Steele had made significant improvements in areas such as discipline, academics, organization and relationships with Texas high school coaches.

"There are few people with the character, integrity and faith that Kevin has,'' Stanton said in a prepared statement Sunday. "However, the need for on-the-field success is always a focal point in the athletic arena.''

Steele would prefer to stay in the college ranks. Before coming to Baylor, Steele spent four seasons as the linebackers coach with the NFL's Carolina Panthers after 14 seasons as a college assistant at Tennessee, New Mexico State, Oklahoma State and Nebraska.