HOUSTON -- Dom Capers can look out the picture windows of his temporary sixth-floor office and watch construction of Reliant Stadium taking place several blocks away alongside its predecessor, the aging Astrodome.

	Dom Capers, left, is busy building the expansion Texans for owner Bob McNair.

The break room around the corner from Capers' office offers coffee, soft drinks, snacks and a telescope on a tripod, trained on the new 69,500-seat retractable roof stadium that will be the home of the NFL's 32nd franchise, the Houston Texans.

While Capers monitors the progress of his new work space and plans for opening day in August 2002 against the Miami Dolphins, others are watching Capers. Can he make the Texans instant winners as he did in getting Carolina to the NFC championship game in two seasons?

"I've been asked so many times how many games we'll win," Caper said. "Every time I say, 'I wish I knew.' "

For the second time in his career, Capers is the head coach of a start-up NFL team. After he was named coach of the Panthers, he had 2½ weeks to get ready for the expansion draft.

Ah, the intoxicating memories of those glory days.

Capers put the Panthers together with an emphasis on veteran players, who helped lead the team to a 7-9 record in the club's first year of competition in 1995.

"The next year we opened a new stadium and we won all eight games we played there in the regular season," Capers said. "We beat the defending Super Bowl champion Cowboys, so you can imagine the euphoria surrounding that."

After becoming big winners their second season, the Panthers found themselves drafting 27th with the big boys.

"We weren't ready for that," Capers said. "I think you have to really keep a handle on the amount of veterans and that you have young guys coming along you feel are capable of developing into winning football players."

As it turned out, the veteran careers waned before younger players could take over. In his third and fourth years, the Panthers faded badly and Capers was fired. He then spent two seasons as defensive coordinator at Jacksonville, learning more about expansion teams.

"From a coaching standpoint, I had people come to me (at Carolina) and say, 'You're winning too much too fast,"' Capers said. "As a coach you want to go win every game. But you have to make sure you aren't sacrificing the long-range goals."

Ah, the voice of experience.

The Texans appealed to Capers partially because of general manager Charley Casserly and owner Bob McNair's desire to build from the ground up with young players.

Fighting the urge for quick success is high on Capers' "don't do" list.

	“	Hopefully you learn from every experience both the good and the bad. The key is what you build long-term. As a coach you have to constantly fight that. ”
		— Dom Capers, Texans coach

"Hopefully you learn from every experience both the good and the bad," Capers said. "The key is what you build long-term. As a coach you have to constantly fight that."

Capers won't use Carolina as his yardstick with the Texans. Nowadays, free agents aren't as available and more teams are around to absorb players.

"If you have a sound plan and blueprint then the toughest challenge is to stay the course," Capers said. "Everybody in the league now wants instant gratification and sometime you can stub your toe in trying to go for that instant success."

Capers intends to keep the Texans on course. The Texans will conduct a mock draft April 21 when the rest of the NFL teams make their annual college selections.

Then, they'll prepare for the free-agent market, the expansion draft in February and the college draft in April 2002.

"If you think we haven't been working, it's because you don't know Charley Casserly," said director of pro scouting Chuck Banker. "We've graded every NFL, XFL and NFL Europe player to prepare for expansion."

It's almost like preparing for two drafts for the Texans: this year's seniors and next year's seniors. That's the job of Mike Maccagnan, coordinator of college scouting.

"It's almost twice as much work for us," Maccagnan said. "We have to focus on the seniors too, but we really have to rate the juniors. The other scouts finish up and hit the road and we're around the rest of the day working on the juniors."