By Bruce Campbell, Staff Writer
July 04, 2009 10:16 pm
—
Steve Hoffsommer can poke fun at himself as he’s about to be inducted into the Oklahoma 8-Man Football Coaches Hall of Fame.
Hoffsommer had an 80-58 record as a head coach, but was 2-7 (2005) and 2-8 (2007) in his last two seasons at Kremlin-Hilsdale, where he’s now the superintendent. Including his stints as an assistant, he had an 127-91 record.
“I don’t think the kids here today thought they played for a hall of fFame coach,’’ said Hoffsommer with a smile. “I’m glad that some of the older guys who followed my career thought I was deserving. I’m grateful and humbled by the award.’’
Hoffsommer will be formally inducted Friday at a banquet the evening before the 8-Man All-Star game in Miami. Former Medford coach Chuck Goodner also is slated to be inducted.
“When I look at the coaches there, I feel like I’m in pretty tall company,’’ Hoffsommer said.
Hoffsommer had 8-man football coaching stints at Kremlin-Hillsdale (1980), Jet-Nash (1981-85), Bluejacket (1987-89), Wakita (1995-2000), Ringwood (2001-04) and Kremlin-Hillsdale (2005 and 07).
In his 19 years as a head coach or assistant, his teams reached the playoffs 11 times. He was an assistant on the 1998 Wakita team, which lost to Balko 26-21 in the 1998 Class C finals.
“I happen to be at the right place at the right time,’’ Hoffsommer said. “I obviously had good players. They make a good coach out of you.’’
In most of his stops, Hoffsommer inherited a team coming off a losing season.
“The first thing you have to do is to convince the kids they can win,’’ Hoffsommer said. “Sometimes we didn’t win in the first year, but by the second, we had it steered in the right direction.’’
Hoffsommer had inherited a 2-7 team in his first stint at Kremlin-Hillsdale, but the Broncs were 31-5 the previous three seasons.
The Broncs went 8-3 that season to give Hoffsommer instant creditability.
“I was real lucky I ran into a real good bunch of kids,’’ he said. “That established that I kind of knew what I was doing. A lot of first-year head coaches don’t have that opportunity. If you’re not a good situation, you might win one or two games and maybe you don’t get asked back.’’
The 1998 season offered Hoffsommer his biggest thrill and heartbreak. Wakita, in the championship game, took the lead on a score with 51 seconds left, only to see Balko scored with 33 seconds remaining.
Balko, who had beaten James Kilian and Medford in the semifinals, had dominated the Warriors in a preseason scrimmage.
“No one had expected us to give them a game,’’ Hoffsommer said. “That was the closest I ever came (to a state title). I told people we were state champions from 51 seconds left in the game until there were 33 seconds left in the game ... those 18 seconds were pretty danged gum fun.’’
The next season, Hoffsommer said, would be as rewarding a season as he’s ever had as the Warriors, in a rebuilding year, went 10-3.
“If someone had told me we would win 10 games the next season, I didn’t think it would happen,’’ Hoffsommer said. “When you’re not expecting much and you win, those are the fun ones.’’
Hoffsommer is regarded as one of the nicest men in coaching. That persona didn’t match the early Hoffsommer.
“Early on I rode the refs and players pretty hard,’’ he said, “but that’s why I wasn’t as effective as I could be.’’
Hoffsommer, after his first year at Kremlin-Hillsdale, resigned in protest over the grade school being moved from his native Hillsdale.
“I was kind of a hot head back then,’’ he said. “Today I would have thought about it longer. When I left, I didn’t think it was fair.’’
Ironically that building would become Hillsdale Christian School, where his oldest daughter, Jenifer, teaches.
“God had a hand in that,’’ Hoffsommer said. “I sure missed a lot of good kids by doing that, but I figured the Lord directed me to where I went.’’
Hoffsommer has coached at nine different schools. A six-year stint at Wakita was the longest.
“I enjoyed being at a lot of different schools,’’ he said. “Meeting people was easy for me.’’
Hoffsommer might have been ahead of his time offensively. His teams were known for multiple sets and being constantly in motion.
He figured if the opponent had to spend more time in practice trying to figure his offense, they would have less time for offensive surprises of their own.
“Toward the end, I probably had too much in,’’ Hoffsommer said. “We probably would have been better off if we had done a few things well instead of doing a whole bunch of things not so well.’’
He loved the wide open eight-man game, especially on 80-yard fields like Freedom. A good kick return would put a team in four-down territory.
“We used to love to go to Freedom,’’ he said, “but those kids would hit you as hard as anybody that we played.’’
Hoffsommer can joke about coaching at his alma mater. He has the distinction of both playing and coaching in an 8-man state championship game.
“When we went 8-3, everybody thought I was a good coach,’’ Hoffsommer said. “I don’t know if they still think that now. I know when I was coaching at Wakita and Ringwood when we beat them, they I thought I was a good coach. It’s more what have you done for me lately.’’
The biggest change Hoffsommer saw was in off-season programs.
In 1980, he didn’t see his team in the summer until the night before practice. Now if a team doesn’t have a year-round weight program “you’re going to get your brains beat.’’
In the days before a circular baler, a farm boy could get himself in shape by throwing the little square bales of hay. Hoffsommer grew up hauling bales weighing 80 to 90 pounds.
“I can’t think of anything that would improve your balance and your endurance more,’’ he said.
Now the average player at Kremlin-Hillsdale is more likely to be working at burger joint or mall than on the farm.
His first grandchild, Jack, who was born when he was at Ringwood helped change his outlook on coaching. He and his wife, Brenda, have two granddaughters — Mia and Hallie.
“Once he was born, I just wanted to come home after school and spend time with him,’’ Hoffsommer said. “That changed my perspective about spending time with other people’s kids opposed to my grandson.’’
He had promised himself if his enthusiasm started to wane, he would get out instead of hanging out as he saw some older coaches do when he was younger.
“I didn’t want to be cheating the kids,’’ he said. “I used to like to watch film, but I didn’t want to spend the whole weekend watching film and breaking it down.’’
His daughters, Jenifer and Jill, were both active in athletics while their father coached. He coached both of them in girls state basketball tournaments — Jenifer at Bluejacket and Jill at Wakita.
Hoffsommer can go back far enough to remember when now-powerful Morrison was once the homecoming opponent for the Broncs.
Morrison coach Dennis Casey, he said, “was way ahead of us’’ as far as offenses were concern, Hoffsommer said. Casey regularly met with coaches at nearby Oklahoma State University.
Oklahoma going to a spread-type offense has influenced the 8-man game in Oklahoma as well as OSU’s multi-offenses.
“You never know what’s coming now,’’ Hoffsommer said.
Hoffsommer left football coaching for five years during stints at Oklahoma Bible Academy (three) and Dover (two). Because of his daughters, his first priority then was girls basketball.
He is glad OBA has football now. He missed the game day while watching soccer instead of football there.
“A winning football team sets the tone for the whole school year,’’ Hoffsommer said.
He built a strong program in three years at Bluejacket in far northeastern Oklahoma. But his family wanted to return to northwest Oklahoma so when OBA headmaster Dallas Caldwell beckoned, he was receptive.
Bluejacket would reach the state finals the season after.
He returned to football as an assistant football and head girls basketball coach at Wakita. He assisted four coaches — John Bob Dixon, Rod Beer, Eric Green and Mike Thompson.
After each coach left, Hoffsommer had asked the Wakita board to let him be the head football coach. He was turned down because officials didn’t want the girls basketball coach to be the head football coach.
When Kelly McCoy, Hoffsommer’s son-in-law and then Ringwood girls coach, found out Red Devil football coach Nick Werner was retiring, he contacted his father-in-law.
Hoffsommer would take the Devils to four playoff appearances before going back to Kremlin-Hillsdale as a coach and administrator.
He is sorry to see Wakita not fielding football teams anymore. He could see the writing on the wall when 20 seniors were graduating, but only three or four were entering kindergarten.
The school system went from having 180 overall students to 110.
“Those kids got an awfully good education at Wakita,’’ Hoffsommer said.
His two best players he ever coached were running backs Pat Koehn, both of Kremlin-Hillsdale and Jet-Nash and Nick Morland of Wakita.
His best line was the 1980 Kremlin-Hillsdale trio of Frank Kaufman, Danny Hole and Phil Wolfe. Kaufman was only 5-foot-7 and 160 but was still strong.
Hole and Wolfe could have played running back because of their quickness.
“They could pull and trap and just bury people,’’ Hoffsommer said
Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.