Forty years flew by for West Chicago's McCarthy
Cutting the grass, watching the kids. Realistically, much of Dan McCarthy's life won't change.
"I've got a lot of stuff planned," West Chicago's baseball coach said before trimming the infield Tuesday, one of the handful of days remaining in a 40-year career as a high school coach and educator.
"It's bittersweet to say I'll be done in the classroom. That part of my life is going to be over, and that's going to be tough," said McCarthy, a business teacher who's spent the last 20 years as a Wildcat after breaking in at Joliet Catholic then going to Ottawa Marquette.
"I truly believe one of the things I benefitted from in education is when you're around 16-, 17-, 18-year-old students it can't help but make you feel younger. Even though I'm 64 years old I don't feel like I'm 64. I feel like I have the same things to offer when I came out of Lewis (University). Forty years went by quickly," he said.
Except for at least temporarily shelving the business curriculum, McCarthy will maintain his same activities and passions. With four children and five grandchildren either in the south or west suburbs he and his wife, Debbie, are staying right here.
Ten-year-old Colin Azuse of Downers Grove is McCarthy's oldest grandson. When the coach of Colin's travel baseball team found out who grandpa was, an assistant coaching job quickly opened.
Frank Mariani, a contemporary of McCarthy, coaches Colin's 11-under team. His late father, also Frank, coached McCarthy at Holy Cross High School and Lewis University.
Like most sports veterans McCarthy brims with neat stories and trivia. He played the outfield for Gordie Gillespie's first NAIA championship squad at Lewis, as a senior in 1974. When McCarthy was a sophomore, Lewis' sole loss during its annual Florida trip came against Florida A&M, featuring Andre Dawson.
McCarthy will help coach his grandson's travel team, and he'll continue to assist the women's basketball program at the University of St. Francis in Joliet, a much more forgiving wintertime commute from his Shorewood home. When McCarthy arrived at West Chicago in 1996 it was as boys basketball coach, a position he kept five seasons.
McCarthy once had a 52-win season as Joliet Catholic's baseball coach. He has lost 20 games in a season at West Chicago. These numbers, good and bad, are footnotes to a career whose true impact is often best measured years later, when students return to shake his hand, extend a wedding invitation, show him a baby picture.
"For all the times you might question your career choice it's times like that that really make the educational aspect of that worthwhile. You do touch a lot of lives, and being in it over 40 years there's a lot of relationships you develop that you can't replace," McCarthy said.
He's considering a West Chicago alumni baseball game to keep those relationships current.
"I'm truly blessed to have this type of career," he said. "It's been a great 40 years."
Can-do spirit
Prediction: Glenbard West will win a girls state track championship this weekend in Charleston.
At the Lake Park sectional it qualified three relays, individual distance runners Katie Hohe, Katherine Kenwood and Lindsey Payne, and pole vaulter Jessica Michel. They'll certainly pursue a Class 3A trophy, successfully or not.
Their teammates, though, could make coach Kelly Haas' Hilltoppers the Illinois High School Association's first Combined Team State Champion.
A concept approved by the IHSA Board in June 2015, points gained by Hilltoppers wheelchair athletes Daniela Polencheck, a sophomore, and Ahalya Lettenberger, a freshman, will be added to points earned through the normal scoring process. Polencheck and Lettenberger both will be competing in the 100- and 400-meter sprints, wheelchair division, with Lettenberger adding the 200.
"This is an inclusive sport and I think it's cool for the IHSA to put it out like that," Haas said.
The minimum threshold for Combined trophies to be awarded was four athletes, and this year's girls field met that. Lettenberger and Polencheck are joined by Niles West freshman Danielle Dimaria and Metamora sophomore Savanna Klobnak. In 2015 Polencheck beat three other girls in the 100 and four others in the 200, including Klobnak in each race.
"I've got two gifted athletes," Haas said. "Yeah, there's only four, five kids competing at the state level, but these kids are athletes."
Adding potential ringers to bulk up school trophy cases is not the point. Haas stresses that Lettenberger and Polencheck practice with Glenbard West's track team, under Hilltoppers coaching. They are included and supported by the full squad.
"The kids are in classes with them. It's kind of a natural progression to see them out on the track," said Haas, who credited the Great Lakes Adaptive Sports Association for its support, as well as Glenbard West athletic director Joe Kain and District 87 for its "can-do attitude."
"We push team, team, team," Haas said. "I think it's always good to bring in that focus."
Ice Man Bowl Cometh
Matt Foster's got things moving in a reinvigorated College of DuPage football program.
The coach has a couple ex-Chaparrals on NFL rosters as rookies, placed a dozen players into four-year programs since last season with maybe more to come, and has led COD to postseason bowls in two of his three seasons there.
His latest move is spearheading a new junior college bowl game, the Red Grange Bowl, which will debut Dec. 3 and be hosted annually through 2019 by College of DuPage.
"It's kind of a big deal for us," said Foster, who championed a bowl game between the best non-scholarship NJCAA programs. He plans for game proceeds to go to Ronald McDonald House, and for the teams selected to play at the Grange Bowl to conduct community service projects.
In 2015 the NJCAA offered seven bowl games, though two were hosted on the same day at the University of Northern Iowa. College of DuPage (8-2), ranked fourth, lost 14-5 to unranked Arizona Western at the El Toro Bowl in Arizona. In 2013 the Chaparrals played in the Carrier Dome Bowl, which is no longer on the docket.
"There's only a handful of bowl games in the country for the top teams to play in our level, so it's kind of a unique thing. To showcase our kids, our community, our college, to bring national attention to our area is a great thing," Foster said.
Simultaneously he sought to promote Roaring 20s superstar Red Grange, an inaugural Chicago Bear via University of Illinois and Wheaton High School. Besides a statue outside of Memorial Stadium in Champaign, Foster doesn't see much honoring the Galloping Ghost. He hopes the Red Grange Bowl will.
"We are it," he said. "Not that it's Division I, but I felt strongly for what he stood for, what kind of person he was."
doberhelman@dailyherald.com
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