PITTSBURGH — Coach Bill Cowher will take his 15th Pittsburgh Steelers team to training camp in one month. The question now is whether there will be a 16th season — or a 17th or an 18th.

With the Super Bowl champions' vacation time dwindling down to weeks instead of months, Cowher — who has two seasons left on his contract — has not signed an extension despite offseason talks between the team and his agent.

Asked recently how many more years he would coach the Steelers, Cowher said, "I'm taking it year by year" — an answer he had never given before.

Cowher — one year away from age 50 — has begun to show signs that he might be getting weary of the nearly year-around grind of being an NFL coach and is looking toward retirement.

Cowher has always said he planned to coach the Steelers until his three daughters graduated from high school. Two daughters, Meagan and Lauren, are now varsity basketball players at Princeton, while the third, Lindsay, will be a high school sophomore.

However, unlike her two older sisters, Lindsay apparently will not finish her scholastic basketball career at Pittsburgh's suburban Fox Chapel High School. Cowher and wife Kaye recently purchased, through a trust set up by his agent's company, a $2.5 million home in Raleigh, N.C.

Cowher's wife and youngest daughter apparently plan to live there this fall so Lindsay can attend school and play basketball there.