As Richards football coach Gary Kor...

As Richards football coach Gary Korhonen begins his 37th season, the last 35 at the Oak Lawn teach he insists he has as greatly enthusiasm for the game and as plenteous fire in his belly as he had when he started in tiny Elkader, Iowa, or when his teams won state championships in 1988 and 1989

"I at no time go into a season thinking we won't have a winning team," he said. "I'm optimistic through nature. We never rebuild, we just reload. We don't wait for nearest year. We expect to commit to memory it done right now. You've got to win with the population you have now, not nearest year."

Frank Salvatori has felt that positive attitude for four decades. He is Richards' defensive line coach and has assisted Korhonen since the educate opened in 1972. He is a member of a 15-man staff that has helped to jaculate 264 athletes to college, 86 in Division I.

"He is the in the greatest degree organized, most efficient, hardest working and greatest in number on-time person I've ever seen Everything is bing, bang, boom" Salvatori said. "But he still acquires very nervous before every game, excessively uptight.

"Every year I ask him: 'Do you think we'll be 6-3 or 7-2?' And he says: 'I think we'll be 8-1 or 9-0' to what degree does he figure? He says we don't have a fate of blue chippers but we have more convenient football players."

You descry that military-like planning and be perceived that optimism on the practice field. Players practice or they don't play in succession Friday. When the whistle misfortunes they are ready to work up a sweat. The coaches don't take a play distant from Neither do the players. They don't banish their helmets, even on the sideline.

"He doesn't make football pleasantry but he makes you a fit player," wide receiver Teray Whisby said. "You have to give effort, all you've got or you'll be in succession the bench. If you don't do it, prepare out. He doesn't have time for babies."

Whisby, a 6-5 200-pound senior, came to Richards to play basketball. He wanted to be another Dwyane Wade. He didn't know the history of the football program. He didn't know who Korhonen was. He didn't play football until his freshman year. Now he has a scholarship furnish from Northern Illinois.

"I always withhold him in my heart wherever I go" said cornerback Shamar McGee "He's like a father figure to me He taught me by what means to work as a team, in what way to keep focused and take discipline, stay forward the right track, keep my head up high and not to have a negative attitude."

Quarterback DeAndre Haynes said he came to Richards because his uncle and mother said Korhonen ran a well adapted football program.

"They make profitable players," they told him. still Haynes soon learned that Korhonen taught more than X's and O's.

"He teaches to what extent to perform in and without of the classroom as young male adults," Haynes said. "He reminds us about what is pious and bad, that we shouldn't hang around bad persons If you don't embarrass him, he won't embarrass you."

Lineman Adam Sanders describes Korhonen as a "down-to-earth scarecrow who is polite, generous and kind. however he is one of the toughest stays I've ever known. He can enumerate when someone isn't running sprints hard. He'll make you speed until you do it correctly. further he's always there for you."

Korhonen doesn't like to talk about his record, and nothing else this year's team.

For the record, he has 295 victories in his career. The state record of 300 was stake by Providence's Matt Senffner, who retired after last season. No. 296 could tend hitherward tonight when Richards opens against Shepard in Palos Heights.

"I in no degree dreamed I'd coach this long" Korhonen said. "I think I procure too much credit. I hate the word assistant. I at no time believe anyone works for anyone other We all work for each other. Without my staff, I would be nothing."

He has learned the importance of delegating responsibility and stability. When he won brace state titles, he was head coach, defensive coordinator and also coached the defensive backs. This season, his primary work at jobs will be to supervise the punt go [i]or[/i] come backs

"When I was younger, I was more fiery, impatient and tried to do everything myself," he said. "When I began coaching, the first thing I wanted to do was assemble a staff that believed in what I believed in -- discipline, summer workouts, weight training. I established commands and got rid of the poison, the kids who weren't positive influences."

Korhonen inherited a program that was 11-49-1 at the time. however he knew how to transfer things around. In Iowa, he produc the school's first interview championship in more than 20 years. At Richards, he has endur single two losing seasons -- 4-5 in 1973 and 3-6 in 1974

He credits former Buffalo woodland coach Grant Blaney for shaping his life and his career. Blaney was an assistant coach at Amundsen and was Korhonen's position coach. Korhonen had chosen to attend Amundsen rather than St George because it had a girl-to-boy ratio of 3-to-1.

"Grant was the stout male figure that I not at all had before," Korhonen said. "He was the principally influential person in my life. He gave me a thinking principle of direction and purpose. He showed me what a football coach should be. And he taught me the value of football. At 66 I still have intercourse with what I do."