‘A heart as big as the outdoors’: MacDougall to be inducted into COD Athletic Hall of Fame
Matt Foster first met Bob MacDougall at a College of DuPage football camp when Foster was still a student at Wheaton Central High School.
Foster circled back as an assistant to MacDougall from 1991-96, helping the Chaparrals set the National Junior College Athletic Association record for consecutive football victories, at 36.
MacDougall and Foster, who led COD football from 2013-20, remained friends until MacDougall’s death in 2021.
“He was as tough as anyone I’ve been around,” said Foster, who last fall joined MacDougall in the NJCAA Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
“He was tough as nails but had a heart as big as the outdoors to go along with that toughness,” Foster said.
More recollections will be told at the College of DuPage Athletic Hall of Fame induction dinner and ceremony, June 8 at DoubleTree by Hilton in Lisle. Tickets are available through June 3, but unavailable at the door.
MacDougall will join six others in this hall of fame class. He went 174-59 from 1976-96, including that winning streak which featured unbeaten seasons from 1993-95.
MacDougall’s teams won 11 regional titles, and he coached 37 All-Americans and six NFL players, including fellow COD hall of famers Aaron Bailey, Mike Bellamy, and Paul Spicer. MacDougall sent 92% of his players to four-year college football programs.
Including stops at Michigan Tech and Joliet Junior College, in NJCAA history MacDougall’s 218 victories follow only John Eliasik’s 249 wins at Harper College.
Foster said MacDougall was good at everything as a football coach and was there for people behind the scenes.
“Game tactician, the management of players, recruiting — he was phenomenal at all of it,” Foster said. “He was extremely organized, extremely disciplined, extremely detailed. And he led with his heart.”
Another quality coach, Earl Reed, will join MacDougall in the hall. Also a professor and athletic director during his 28 years at the Glen Ellyn college, Reed won two women’s basketball national titles and assisted on a men’s tennis national champion.
Reed’s team captain from 2000-02, Brigid Barrett, will be inducted. She helped the Chaparrals win the 2002 title and was named tournament MVP. A second-team All-American that season, overall with Barrett at point guard COD went 51-7.
Outgoing College of DuPage President Brian Caputo will be inducted, due to his advocacy of the hall of fame, located inside the Physical Education Center arena. Caputo has attended each induction ceremony.
Soccer player Ashley Collins led the nation in goals with 30 in 2008, and scored 62 points in 2009, leading the NJCAA in points each season. She was also a two-time All-American and MVP of the old North Central Community College Conference (N4C).
John Fry, who holds COD’s 10,000-meter record (31 minutes, 18.21 seconds), is in the NJCAA Track and Field Hall of Fame. He won a national cross country title, was a repeat champ in the 5,000 and 10,000 in track, won a steeplechase title with a runner-up in the 1500. Fry led the Chaparrals to the 2006 NJCAA title as a freshman.
Soccer player Mark Suda, a Downers Grove South graduate, was a two-time first-team All-American. Suda scored 41 goals with 17 assists his freshman year in 1991 and added 25 goals with 10 assists the next season. He led COD to two top-five national finishes and a cumulative record of 42-4-3.
Watch out for these guys
On April 18, USA Today released its initial “national watch list” for boys high school volleyball player of the year. It goes 50 deep, all but six of them seniors.
Included on the list are 6-foot-10 Barrington outside hitter Cole Hartke, headed to Pepperdine; uncommitted Glenbrook South setter James Ganzorig; and Wheaton North outside hitter Jake Schreiner, who will play at Lindenwood. All are seniors.
Elgin Academy senior outside hitter Kaden Saurer also was on the list, but the Warriors didn’t have enough players to field a team this season. They went 25-7 in 2023 with Kaden and brother Kyle Saurer, now playing for Brigham Young. Kaden Saurer will play for Queens University of Charlotte.
The 25-man USA Today High School Sports Awards team won’t be announced until August, with one player chosen as player of the year.
Now hear this
Friends and alumni of Glenbrook South boys track and field coach Kurt Hasenstein are invited to a celebration of the coach’s 33-year career after the John Davis Titan Invitational on May 3 in Glenview.
Hasenstein, who took over as head coach after Davis’ death in 2001, is retiring after this school year.
A Bartlett resident and a former North Central College decathlete, Hasenstein was previously surprised when at the conclusion of the Glenbrook South Indoor Relays on Feb. 24, it was announced the meet will be renamed the Kurt Hasenstein Indoor Relays.
Information about the May 3 reception is available on the website, titandistance.com.
doberhelman@dailyherald.com