NU coach would do ‘anything* for team
KENDIG from page 9
nothing to worry about
It was a message of both urgency
and encouragement The gymnasts rose
from the dead, stuck the last event, won
the match and had themselves believing
again. Whatever the coach had told
them obviously gotten through to them
in a hurry.
Dan Kendig proved at that moment
he had a way with people. And he does.
And if he doesn’t have a way with some
person, he’s going to find one.
Kendig’s out there. You can’t miss
him. Whether it’s in the gym during
practice, in the arena during a meet or at
the grocery store, when Kendig’s
around you know it
As head coach of the No. 7 women’s
gymnastics team in the nation, a team
that has never lost a conference title
under his guidance, and a man who has
taken two different gymnastics pro
grams to national prominence in 16
years, Kendig is more than a coach.
He’s a promoter. No matter who he’s
talking to, there’s always a message he’s
trying to get across. He has to.
Women’s gymnastics, especially at
NU, is not football; it does not get auto
matic attention and praise. It takes more
than top-notch performances to raise
eyebrows. So Kendig uses his passion
ate energy for his sport and makes it
contagious.
“He’s like the Don King of women’s,
gymnastics, minus the hair,” NU
Assistant Coach Rob Drass said.
But Kendig doesn’t need the electri
cally charged hairstyle of King for you
to know he’s sending a message. Along
with his stand-out appearance -the
remains of a brick-house gymnast’s
physique - you know it through his
piercing eyes, his flailing arms, his bois
terous voice, his genuine smile.
This week may be the most impor
tant in his coaching career - his life,
really - in sending a message. The
NCAA Regional will be in Lincoln this
weekend, and he’s trying to keep his
gymnasts confident to qualify for the
NCAA Finals that eluded them last year.
Almost as important, he’s trying to
keep the public aware that he and the
team could use all the help they can get
“He’ll do anything, absolutely any
thing, to get people to come to a meet,”
senior Jessica Swift said.
“He does sometimes make a fool of
himself,” junior All-American Heather
Brink said. “But it’s good for us.”
He gives out free tickets to people at
the supermarket. He gives out free hats,
schedule cards and posters at home
meets. He’ll go right up and tell you,
whether you’re a reporter or just some
one he bumped into, how his team is
doing and when the next home meet is.
And then, there’s Kendig’s dream.
“Like this Regional. If I just had
some magic words, if I could do any
thing,” Kendig said, eyes popping out
and veins starting to protrude from his
forehead.
“If I could get on a bullhorn and just
scream to everyone, ‘Just this one time,
come out and watch this team,’ and they
came. I wouldn’t have to beg them
back.”
Master communicator
He certainly doesn’t have to do
much begging to get his gymnasts to lis
ten and respond. Assistant Coach
Rhonda Faehn-Tetreault, who as a
young gymnast trained under die one of
the most decorated and successful
coaches in the world, former Romanian
and USA National Team Coach Bela
Karolyi, said so.
“Is Dan boisterous? Yes,” Faehn
Tetreault said. “But that’s very impor
tant Bela was the same way. One thing
about Dan is he is very straightforward.
He tells it like it is.
“If you’re like a little mouse - not
vocal, not commanding a presence,
you’re not going to get any respect from
your athletes. He has that. That’s why
they respect him and listen to him -
because he’s able to get his point
across.”
And although some of the team’s
more experienced and successful mem
bers, such as Brink and senior Misty
Oxford, don’t always see eye to eye with
Kendig, they hear him loud and clear.
‘ ‘One of the tilings about him and I is
that our personalities are so alike - we’re
just so stubborn. We’ve butted heads
many times,” said Brink, who has
trained with national-level coaches.
“He’s by far been the best communica
tor as a coach I’ve had.”
For Oxford, Kendig’s communica
tion is paramount She admits she, like
many female gymnasts, has immense
emotional fragility and needs Kendig to
put her in her place when the going gets
rough.
1 m always way up or way down
with my emotions,” Oxford said. “He
helps by telling me to take my big down
moments as learning experiences. He
just says, ‘Settle down, take a deep
breath. That was just one time.’
“He never gets too up or too down.
We know how he’s going to be with his
moods, what he expects. He tells us
when you walk in die door, shut every
thing out and focus on gymnastics. He
coaches. That’s what he does.”
Thank the Funk
But Kendig was never sure that
coaching was going to be his life. He did
have a hunch, however, that gymnastics
would be.
After competing and coaching in
high school in Covington, Ken., he
headed off to compete at Kentucky,
where he was handed his first bad card
in gymnastics in the mid-1970s, as UK
dropped men’s gymnastics.
So Kendig used his tumbling abili
ties and became a cheerleader. That’s
when the women’s coach, Leah Little,
who still coaches there today, hired him
as a “meat man,” a spotter and assistant
to the team with some coaching tasks.
After two years at UK, Kendig was
informed that Husker Head Coach Judy
Schalk needed a full-time assistant
Despite his lack of experience,
Schalk called a week after he applied
and offered him the job. Kendig was rid
dled with indecision about leaving his
home state, which he loved, for the first
time in his life.
That s when the sign came. From a
very unlikely place called Funkytown.
That’s right. Funkytown.
“Instead of going out to the bar with
my friends that night, I stayed at home,
went up to my room, turned the radio
on, got out my Bible and sat on my bed,”
Kendig said.
“And the first words I heard from
the radio was from the song
‘Funkytown.’ And the first thing I
remember hearing is, ‘I’ve got to move
to a town that’s right for me.’ I turned the
radio off, put the Bible down and called
Judy the next day.”
It was 1980. And when Kendig
arrived in Lincoln, he fell in love with
the town, the University of Nebraska
Lincoln, its athletic department and
especially its people.
Schalk resigned in 1983. Kendig
applied to replace her as head coach. He
was beaten out by Rick Walton. In those
days, women’s gym teams usually had
one male and one female coach - it was
simply the standard. With Walton need
ing a female assistant, Kendig was out
of the job.
But Kendig had made enough of a
name for himself as a coach that he was
a hot item after Walton’s hiring. A small
Division II school in Indiana, Pa.,
offered him the head coach position,
which he took. In nine years, Kendig led
Indiana to two national championships
and consistently beat top Division I
teams.
Indiana dropped gymnastics alter
the 1992 season, and Kendig was hired
at Cornell in 1993 to coach the team for
one year, but it, too, would soon be
dropped. But luckily for Kendig, some
old friends from Nebraska needed him
even more than he needed them.
A new beginning
In 1993, NU’s women’s gymnastics
team was by no means struggling. It still
took a back seat in recognition to the
seven-time national champion men’s
team (it still does, somewhat), but it won
consistently under Walton.
But things were not working out
between the coach and his gymnasts,
and the men’s team. A lack of unity
meant an uncomfortable atmosphere,
something Men’s Gymnastics Head
Coach Francis Allen and Athletic
Director Bill Byrne could ill afford to
put up with any longer.
Walton resigned. Allen, who was
the most influential voice in hiring the
new coach, recommended Kendig
based on his communication and pro
motional dolls.
“Dan had the inside track because of
how he handles his gymnasts,” Allen
said.
“We’ve got better gymnasts now in
the women’s program because of him.
He’s an improver. Only good people
attract good people, and a good person
is not going to work for an asshole. It has
a trickle-down effect from the coach,”
Allen said.
; As with his stint at Indiana, Kendig
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made an immediate impact. In his six
years, Nebraska has won all six Big
8/Big 12 Championships and made it to
the Super Six finals of the NCAA
Championships two years ago.
This year’s team has set both indi
vidual and school records, including
best team performance ever at the Big
12’s last week.
It isn’t difficult for his peers to
explain why Kendig’s programs are
such successes.
“Dan’s probably not the best moti
vator or the best technique coach,”
Drass said. “But he combines all the
traits a good coach must have, really
well. When you break them down, it’s a
good mix, like in a recipe. He combines
the ingredients perfectly. It’s like a well
oiled machine here.”
In practice, Kendig will always be
seen totally involved in whatever gym
nast he’s coaching. When Swift was
practicing a bar routine, Kendig was
standing nervously, hands on knees,
asking Swift, “Do you need me to be
there?” at the end of her routine to help
her landing. She said yes. So he was
there throughout the whole routine.
“He’s like a father to us,” Swift said.
“He’s always asking us how we’re
doing, if everything is OK. You can tell
he really cares about you,” she said.
One big happy family
If you ever pick up anything from
watching the women’s gymnastics team
practice or compete in meets or from
talking with them, you’ll realize real
quickly the cornerstone of Kendig’s
coaching philosophy - teamwork.
He even spills the teamwork con
cept into his promoting. He insists that
all of his team’s media guides and
posters be graced with every single
member, and he lobbies the media to
cover more than the same two or three
name-makers on the team.
“Team over self, that’s the slogan he
gave the team this year,” Swift said.
“From day one, he comes in and tells
you that we’re all in this together.”
Kendig takes the group unity aspect
one step further. As a bachelor, he does
n’t treat the Nebraska gymnasts as just
his team, but his family.
“Even if I did have my own kids, this
team would be my family,” Kendig said.
‘‘When we sign a kid, we tell her and her
parents, ‘Welcome to the (Nebraska
gymnastics) family” Kendig said.
Added Faehn-Tetreault: “This isn’t
just his family, it’s his life. People don’t
know that he is Nebraska gymnastics
24-7. If he’s not in the gym, he’s out pro
moting the team, doing whatever he can
for us.”
Just one wish
Kendig would agree. His enthusi
asm about his job, about his team, is
apparent in every move he makes.
When out on the mat, he can’t stand still.
Even when you talk to him in his office,
he can’t sit still.
“This is my life,” Kendig said. “It’s
what I do and I enjoy doing it You’ve got
to wake up every day and tell yourself
today’s going to be a good day. It’s easy
to get down. I don’t allow myself to do it.
You can’t do it for very long. You have
got to love what you do.”
So with having the job he that “will
take remarkable circumstances” to pull
him away, wife life perfectly in perspec
tive, wife everyone surrounded by him
showing nothing but support for him, is
there anything that is missing for
Kendig?
Kendig, on cue wife full body ani
mation, motioning fee genie pose, says
he has one wish.
“Nothing hurts me more to have a
meet at home and to look up in the
stands and not see people there,” Kendig
said.
“I don’t understand what else we
need to do to get people there. We’re
successful, fee kids look good out there,
it’s exciting gymnastics. People would
love it, and they would come back.
“Ifl had fee magic, if I could change
just one thing, it would be to fill feat
arena. That would mean so much to me
and this program.”
Even after a three-hour interview,
Kendig couldn’t help but slip in a pro
motion. And he won’t stop doing it until
he f nds a way to get feat dream to hap
pen.
A few months into his first j
a break from his nine-to-fivi
alive." Gary found his answ
service in a rural cc
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