The End.
By: Jon Carroll
Tags: Track And Field, High School, Retirement

Chad Wetzel I only was able to work with for one season after he came over from running a successful Cross Country and Track & Field program over at Riley. He was one of the best coaches in the area and was able to have consistent success at a smaller school where it isn’t always as easy to. The only regret that I had working with Chad is that we were only able to work together for one year. He could have easily came over as a former head coach and pulled the “well this is how we would do things” and been halfway committed, but he never did. He approached me with ideas that I ended up implementing (Hello Mariano doubling the 1600/3200 at conference) and really had the kids best interests at heart. Chad was a volunteer coach and we generally try to give a stipend to those at the end of the year, and I remember asking him about taking a nice bus to Regionals but it might cost him his volunteer check because we spent a decent amount, and he immediately said “book the bus.” It was always about the kids with Chad and he developed a great rapport with the athletes.

Matt Cates came aboard as the strength and conditioning coach a few seasons after I was hired. The results were immediate and I think they are going to continue to improve as he continues to implement his program throughout the PHM schools. When I am asked by people outside of the corporation if you noticed a difference at all having a strength coach, the answer is an unequivocal yes. It’s not where you probably think it is though. People assume that it would be the throwers and such who would benefit the most, but those guys already liked to lift. I noticed it way more with the runners and especially the distance runners with the core strength that they developed being in his class. He is not the stereotypical weights coach who just wants to pack on muscle for the sake of doing it, it is entirely performance based to help the athletes excel in their respective sports with explosiveness and power, not needless bulk.

Former Coaches:

Brad Robertson was the previous head coach and I could not ask for a better guy to learn from. The most influential coach that I have ever played under. He was continuously a resource over the years and I cannot thank him enough. Probably knew more about more than any other track coach I had been around. I talk about Coach Robertson in my previous article on here.

Tim Huff stuck around year one and really helped me out. There was no reason for him to, but I will never forget his gesture to stick around for a year to help me out. Also did a tremendous job at Grissom Middle School developing athletes.

Chase Pinion had the enthusiasm to match his experience. Another guy who had to walk into a position with some elite guys and Chase absolutely produced getting multiple guys down to state. Along the lines with Coach Duong, another really good character guy. He is still Coaching at Bethel and I enjoy running into him at the various meets.

Brandon Noe worked with the throwers for a year and took the guys to a different level

Ron Vernasco was the first pole vault coach I had and we were able to double/triple points at most meets because they were the strength of that first team.

Logan Griffith did an outstanding job with the hurdlers during his time with the team and it was always great to have a former State Champion on the staff.

Athletic Department:

Over the course of my time as a Head Coach I worked with various Athletic Directors at Penn. I was hired by Ben Karasiak & Bridget Williams. Thank you for taking a chance on me. I have no clue why you did, but I really do appreciate it! Aaron Leniski was the athletic director during my first few years and always provided tremendous support. Aaron was always direct with me and the guy really wants to win. Even though he is no longer in the athletic department, he still does what he can to support the program, and he was extremely supportive of me throughout the years. Jeff Hart & Marie Doan have been the athletic directors that I have worked with the most closely over the past three seasons and they are extremely easy to work with. They never micromanaged me and always let me run the program as I saw fit. I am not the most conventional coach to work with and I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed the freedom that they allowed me to have. They were supportive and would allow me to rant at time if I was ever having a bad week with the program.

I was always impressed with those who handled the logistical aspects of the program and made my life easier. Sandy Heston, Patti Vavul, Courtney Lapehn and Jennifer Dunderman handled all of the hotel rooms, uniform orders, meals, purchase orders, academic administration, senior night, tickets, and 50,000 other logistical components of running a successful team. (Just make sure you don’t use a credit card without getting a purchase order first!) These are some of the most unheralded people of athletic departments throughout the state and keep the engine running.

Other Coaches

Michael Clements has done a great job with the Cross Country team over the years and is probably the first guy I go to when I want an outside opinion. “Hey Mike, what would you do in this situation _____?” and he always provides valuable feedback and talks me off the ledge sometimes when I get all fired up. The work he is doing with integration of the middle school & high school programs is going to pay dividends in the future. He is also a very interesting and smart guy if you ever want to talk about obscure things (AMC Stock, African Cuisine, Places to Visit)

Kyle Shaw at Mishawaka year after year outperforms expectations. I know they are the natural rival and I am supposed to think mean things or something like that but I have the utmost respect with the way that he runs a program. It never matters what he starts with, because I know over the course of the year they are going to have a well coached competent track team that is going to get a pile of guys to state. We had the luxury of talent and experience this past season and we beat them pretty good to open up the season, but I knew that he would figure it out and have improvement and by the end of the year and sure enough, he was able to send a pile of guys to State. He also managed to beat one of our loaded Penn teams (yeah one of the Tim Deal years) for the conference one year and that doesn’t happen without quality coaching. He’s not going to get a ton of attention because he is at a smaller school and he is not a self promoter (ahem, sorry), but if all talent is equal he is one of the best in the state. Had some great assistants over the years in Shane Jodway and Keith Kinder as well.

Mike McCarthy is at St. Joe and is always looking to better Track & Field in the area for all of the teams. He was one of the driving factors of the NIC JV meet, was willing to host an absurd amount of meets while coaching both the girls and the guys squads and is always looking to see what the conference can do better. I really am not sure how he has time to do all of the roles that he does, but like Shaw, you can always expect a St Joe squad to be fundamentally sound and improve over the course of a season. Was always willing to put in the time and do extra. He also hosted some summer meets just to provide guys with opportunities.

Matt Thacker is currently at Fairfield but I knew him more from his years at Warsaw. He competed with the best teams that we had at Penn and they got the better of us quite a bit. He ran a top notch program and is a top notch guy. He is now currently coaching Football & Track over at Fairfield, and it was not a surprise to me to see him inherit a team that didn’t win a game in football and lead them to an undefeated regular season just a few years later.

Jacob Balch has been retired for a few years now, but he did a fantastic job over at Elkhart Central while he was there. We had some battles with them and I felt that it always made both of our squads better. He won with class, if he lost he was always there to be the first one to congratulate you. Another guy that did everything he could to promote Track & Field in the area.

Adrian Swanson has been coaching at Washington and is a guy who always puts kids first. He put together summer teams to help provide opportunities and exposure for not only his own athletes, but as well as others in the area. Another guy who always puts the kids first.

Chuck Sowders, Raoul Donati, Mark Burns, & David Sears, Tim Huff did a great job with the feeder programs over the years. Having a positive experience in middle school is critical to getting guys out for the team in high school and they are not always noticed when the high school team wins. A ton of these guys sent us over athletes that already knew the fundamentals and how to practice and compete at a high level.

Support Staff

Trish Irvin has been the head athletic trainer since I became a coach at Penn. Really one of the biggest battles that we have running a track program is keeping the athletes healthy. If you look at our squads over the course of the past few years, we managed to stay healthier than most others and she is a key reason why. Runs a professional operation and is always great with communicating the truth to us which is critical in us making decisions.

Meet Helpers

The hidden MVPs of a track season are the meet helpers who work the various events throughout a season. To not have to worry about some of these positions being filled takes an enormous amount of stress off of the coach. We had a few consistent ones through the years I was coaching.

Rory Paquette ran the throws events and ran them well. At a poorly ran meet, you can expect the Shot Put to still be running after the events on the track have concluded. With Rory you could always expect the people in the press box to say, “throws are already done?” because he was so efficient. I am also extremely thankful he decided to send his kids to Penn. It made me look good.

Trent Yeoman volunteered to time / work meets even after staff was no longer required to do so. He was the only staff member to do this every single year I was around. It is not uncommon to see the Yeoman’s at Penn functions, truly a key part of the fabric of Penn.

John Mott, along with Rory Paquette I am pretty sure worked every home meet that we had while his kids were on the team. He was always there to do what was best for the program. Also a big thanks to his wife Wendy Mott who organized the Poster for three years. As soon as she was gone, well, the poster was gone as well!

Bob Wentroble ran the High Jump for us over the past two seasons and was another person who was easy to count on.

Curt Rallo & The Pennant always did a great job promoting the program and announcing the meets. Are they one and the same? Sources are conflicting.

Mike Alspaugh is an IHSAA Official who always ran a fair, efficient meet. He helped the kids out with uniform issues and was always incredibly approachable about any type of questions and a really nice guy. Besides golf, there are probably more silly rules with Track & Field than any other sport, and he always made it easy to digest.

Coaches who hosted Big Meets

If you ever wanted to hear me say “No!” without thinking just ask if I ever wanted to host a Big Meet or an Invitational. Hosting a meet is complex, difficult, stressful and can often take away from your primary job which is to Coach the team. We only hosted the Sectional each year and that was quite enough for me.

Penn has attended various meets over the years, but I would like to thank the following schools and their coaches & athletic departments for hosting the meets that we competed at this past year. Without them, we do not have the positive experiences for the athletes. All of them were well ran and enjoyable.