John Gagliardi and the Gospel of
No
By Rick Kelsheimer
John Gagliardi has won more college football games than any
coach who has ever lived. His career record of 484-133-11 puts him far ahead of
Penn State’s Joe Paterno with 409 wins and the late Eddie Robinson with 408. The 85 year
old Gagliardi just completed his 59th season as the Head Football
Coach of the Saint John’s University Johnnies in Collegeville, Minnesota and
has no plans for retirement in the near future. Under Gagliardi, the Johnnies have won 4
national championships and 27 conference championships. In 2006 Gagliardi was
elected to the College Hall of Fame, becoming only one of three active coaches
to do so. Joe Paterno and Chris Ault from the University of Nevada are the other
two.
The fact that John Gagliardi has been so successful at Saint John’s over
a long period of time is one thing; the way that he has gone about doing it is
another. Gagliardi has a list of “no’s” in his coaching philosophy that might
leave the average fan and other football coaches scratching their collective
heads. Here are some examples:
· No blocking sleds or dummies
· No athletic scholarships
· No compulsory weightlifting program
· No whistles
· No "coach" - players call him John
· No tackling in practice - players wear shorts or
sweats
· No long practices - an hour and a half or less
Gagliardi wants to set an
environment where his players have fun and still live up to his high
expectations. He uses a system of stressing fundamentals and repetition of
running plays on offense and attacking the play on defense at the most critical
point. By emphasizing thoughtful repetition and flawless execution in practice,
everything seems second nature in the games.
As far as his policy of no tacking
or blocking in practice, Gagliardi explains his theory. “All of our players
know how to tackle in high school. I feel that by having a lot of physical
contact, all you do is expose your players to injury. “You can have the best
players in the country, but what good can they do if they break an arm in
practice?”
“We feel lucky to have A National
Treasure in John Gagliardi,” says Saint John’s Athletic Director Tom Stock.
He’s a legend around here. His life experiences could fill countless books. He
has coached in eight decades and built something special up here in Minnesota.
We lead all Division III schools in attendance will over 10,000 per game.
That’s quite a testimony to John. He’s slowed down a little over the years. Now
he drives his golf cart around the practice field, but he hasn’t lost the fire.
Don’t let his calm demeanor fool you. He still loves to win and hates to lose.
John likes to joke that he’d like to coach another one or two decades. That’s
not bad for a guy who started coaching when the players still had leather
helmets.”
“It’s been a down year for us at Saint
John’s” explains Stock. “We have a young team and it showed on the field. John
seems to take it all in stride, though. He says that adversity builds character
and its great time for teaching.”
According to Stock, Gagliardi also
likes to get involved in the personal lives of his players. “John’s been known
to be a bit of a match maker around campus. He tells the girls at a sister
college that football players make the best husbands. And of those—offensive
lineman make the best of the best. The reason he gives is that they always work
harder than everyone else and never complain. It’s difficult for him not to get
involved. He is actually coaching the grandsons of some his former players.”
Gagliardi has been known to pull a star player
so they can take the LSAT or MSAT exams.
After
he graduated from Colorado College in 1949, Gagliardi’s first college coaching
position was at Carroll College in Helena, Mont. The college was thinking about
dropping football because of losing seasons and lack of interest. Gagliardi led
Carroll to three conference titles in his first four seasons as a college
coach. Gagliardi also coached basketball and baseball at Carroll.
His
success at Carroll, caught the attention of Saint John's University in
Collegeville, Minnesota. Saint John's needed a coach to succeed the legendary
Johnny "Blood" McNally, a charter member of the Professional Football
Hall of Fame.
Compared
to Carroll, Saint John's football program was healthy before Gagliardi's
arrival, but not exactly thriving. SJU had not won a conference title in 15
years. Gagliardi took over the program in 1953 full of optimism. Meanwhile,
Blood offered this gloomy prediction: "Nobody could ever win at Saint
John's."
Gagliardi
proved McNally wrong by winning the MIAC title that fall. He also won
championships with Saint John’s track team, and he also coached the hockey team
for five seasons, compiling a 42-25-1 record, which is still the best career
winning percentage of any hockey coach in school history.
After
59 seasons, Gagliardi’s resume’ is mind boggling, He has coached four national
championship teams (1963, 1965, 1976 and 2003), and made the 2000 national
title game. His teams have reached the national semifinals as well in 1989,
1991, 1993, 1994, 2001 and 2002. In 2001, Gagliardi became only the third coach
in NCAA college football history to coach 500 career games.
As
a collegiate coach, Gagliardi's teams have won 30 conference titles and have
appeared in 58 post-season games. In the past 44 years, SJU has been nationally
ranked 43 times, and it owns a 39-19 postseason record. In 1993, SJU averaged
61.5 points per game, setting a record that might never be broken.
After a 2-4 start it looked like
Saint John’s was destined to have their first losing season since 1967. There
was speculation that Gagliardi might not come back next season and retire. But
the Johnnies ended the season with four straight victories and a 6-4 record.
On November 17, Gagliardi ended the
rumors and told the St Cloud Times that he would come back for his 60th
year at Saint John’s.
"There's that satellite up there in space they say could come crashing
back to Earth," Gagliardi told the newspaper, joking. "That could hit
my car as I'm driving home. If that happens, I won't be back."
“We plan on holding John to his
word when he said he wanted to stay around here for another couple of decades,”
jokes Stock. “John Gagliardi is Saint John’s football.
