By BILL SCHWANKE of Missoulian.com Sep 14, 2009
It's been a long and winding road for Barry Sacks since he finished playing football for the Montana Grizzlies in 1979 and graduated from the UM in the spring of 1980.
But the motor that allowed an undersized linebacker to play college football for the Griz has helped steer him down that road with eyes straight ahead and wide open.
After graduating from UM Sacks returned to the Seattle area to student teach and coach in Auburn with his former high school mentor. But wanting badly to return to Montana, Sacks headed to Butte where he lived in Crackerville and coached at Central High School for a season.
The house he rented was owned by the parents of current Colorado State and former Montana State football coach Sonny Lubick.
Then it was back to Seattle for a two-year stint as a high school teacher and coach. It was while there that he got his chance to jump into college coaching.
One of the assistant coaches at Montana during Sacks career was the late Pokey Allen, someone Sacks admired greatly and stayed in touch with following graduation. Allen had promised Sacks an opportunity if and when he got a college head coaching job.
Allen had just finished working in the soon-to-be-defunct U.S. Football League and was pursuing the head job at Portland State.
"I won't be able to pay you much," Allen told Sacks at the time, "(but) if you want to do it, I'll hire you."
Sacks told Allen the pay didn't matter, and when Pokey was hired, so was Sacks. According to Sacks Allen approached former UM assistant Gary Ekegren - at that time coaching in Longview, Wash., and currently the head coach at Missoula Big Sky - but Ekegren chose not to go.
Sacks was hired as defensive line coach for the Vikings and stayed there with Allen for seven seasons until Pokey got the Boise State head job. Sacks tagged along in 1993 and coached at BSU for four seasons.
It was during that time that Allen contracted a cancer that would take his life. The last time Sacks was in Missoula was for Pokey's funeral in 1997.
Boise State hired a new staff and Sacks moved to Adams State College in Alamosa, Colo., where he coached for just one year. By that time he had established a lot of contacts in the coaching profession and one of them, Dave Baldwin, hired him as special teams coordinator and defensive line coach at San Jose State.
Despite the fact that the Spartans beat Stanford three times in the four years they were there Baldwin was let go and Sacks was looking again. But while in San Jose he had become acquainted with the general manager of the Arena Football League SabreCats who offered him a job with that team.
During the year Sacks served as SabreCats defensive coordinator he helped coach former Montana wide receiver Shalon Baker, who also saw duty as a linebacker. Sacks had coached against the Grizzlies when Shalon was playing at UM.
"It was fun to see Shalon and coach him and be around him," Sacks recalled. "He's just an absolute brilliant young man on the football field."
Sacks couldn't shake that college coaching desire, and after a year in the AFL he took a job at Nevada-Reno under then-head coach Chris Tormey in 2002. He's been there ever since and currently serves as special teams coordinator for the Wolf Pack, which opened the 2007 season with a resounding but not unexpected defeat at Nebraska.
In the middle of all the moves Sacks met Teresa and the two were married in 1988 in Portland. One year later they became the proud parents of Alexandra, now a freshman on the Nevada-Reno soccer team. And another year after that along came son Philip, a high school junior in Reno.
Barry and Teresa met at the wedding of Sacks' former UM teammate Arnie Rigoni, who married former UM volleyball star Wendy Hoyt, Teresa's roommate.
Sacks was recruited to UM by head coach Jack Swarthout shortly before his tenure at UM ended. Sacks ended up playing for new Griz head coach Gene Carlson.
He had been entertaining feelers from other schools as his high school career wound down, but when Swarthout finally put forth a solid offer, Sacks jumped on it. He remembers his first trip to Missoula vividly.
"I can remember arriving in Missoula for the first time and looking up the Hellgate Canyon and saying, 'my goodness,'" Sacks remembered.
He had some Montana connections. His mother was born in Bozeman and his grandmother in Livingston. His grandmother was raised in Missoula and lived next door to the original Greenough Mansion on Rattlesnake Creek before it was moved to Farviews.
"I had so much fun, and developed such great friends," Sacks said of his UM days.
Among those friends he still tries to stay in touch with are Bart Andrus, who now lives in Bigfork; fellow linebacker Kent Clausen, now in Spokane; Jim Hogan, now an assistant coach at Carroll College in Helena; and Rigoni, who still lives in Portland.
Sacks started his UM academic career as a radio-television major but figured out that what he really wanted to do was coach. So he switched his major to - and got his degree in - health, physical education and recreation, with a minor in speech and communications.
His decision to get into coaching was inspired mainly by Ekegren and Allen and his love of the game, and despite the urgings of others who said he would never amount to anything if he became a coach.
"I've always loved football," Sacks said. "I knew I wasn't going to play (after college). I was a runt. I was at the absolute peak of my career at that time. I knew it."
Sacks is in his 43rd year of either playing or coaching football.
"I just love being around the game and the people and everything," Sacks said. "I knew I couldn't keep playing it and had to do it in some respect or another.
"I wasn't going to be an official," Sacks went on. "I can't stand those guys."
Sacks isn't exactly sure where the motor that has driven him to succeed all of his life came from. But he dished out a clue.
"I think it burns at you that anybody would ever think that you couldn't do something," Sacks said. "They told me in high school I wasn't big enough to play linebacker, and all that ever did was piss me off, so I always wanted to make sure I picked out the biggest s.o.b. I could and at least hit him in the head."
Sacks now works with Nevada head coach Chris Ault, back for his third stint with the Wolf Pack.
"He's an absolute ball for me," Sacks said. "He knows how to win. He understands the climate of a football team, the climate of individuals in football. He understands what motivates people around him."
Sacks recognized the quality in Ault because he had seen the same thing in Pokey Allen years earlier.
"He could stick his finger in the air and understand the climate of a football team," Sacks said of Allen, "and I think coach Ault's the same way."
Sacks said he couldn't imagine what Ault - who now has coached college football in four different decades - was like as a younger coach, but he said he's mellowed during this latest run.
Sacks also downplays the possible problems that could come with coaching and playing in a city known for gambling. In fact, he said natives of Reno are much like people from Montana.
"They're very warm," he said. "They're very welcoming. They'll bend over backwards for you. It's a big small town. The fabric is fantastic."
One of his best UM memories was a 24-8 win over Montana State in 1978, the only win over the Cats in his four seasons in Missoula. He knows current UM coach Bobby Hauck quite well and does his best to keep track of his former team.
"It just makes me proud of my alma mater every time I look at the Internet and … keep track of their scores and what they're doing," Sacks said, "especially when they make the I-AA playoffs."
Sacks believes UM could make the jump to I-A, or FBS, football quite easily.
"I may pop off too much, but you compare Missoula to Logan, Utah (Utah State), there's no comparison." Sacks said. "Missoula's a better college town, better college atmosphere, and (has) more support.
"Or, for that matter, Moscow, Idaho," he added. "Missoula's a better town, a better place, a better college football venue."
Sacks seems to handle the task of being a parent of athletes with the right approach. All he told them was that they had made a commitment and needed to give it 100 percent.
"Second of all I tell them the greatest joy in my life is to watch them play," Sacks said, adding that putting a ball in their hands was the best gift he felt he could give them.
In the end Sacks still gives his UM days high grades for helping him get where he is today.
"It was a great education," Sacks said. "Professor Wilson (anatomy and physiology teacher Vince) … taught me … the beauty of learning.
"And also my years or perseverance and loyalty to my friends," he went on. "And the fact that the people of Missoula embraced me throughout those years and I really enjoyed that. I get a pitter-patter in my heart whenever I think about them."
How could they not embrace a little guy with a motor like that?
It's been a long and winding road for Barry Sacks since he finished playing football for the Montana Grizzlies in 1979 and graduated from the UM in the spring of 1980.
But the motor that allowed an undersized linebacker to play college football for the Griz has helped steer him down that road with eyes straight ahead and wide open.
After graduating from UM Sacks returned to the Seattle area to student teach and coach in Auburn with his former high school mentor. But wanting badly to return to Montana, Sacks headed to Butte where he lived in Crackerville and coached at Central High School for a season.
The house he rented was owned by the parents of current Colorado State and former Montana State football coach Sonny Lubick.
Then it was back to Seattle for a two-year stint as a high school teacher and coach. It was while there that he got his chance to jump into college coaching.
One of the assistant coaches at Montana during Sacks career was the late Pokey Allen, someone Sacks admired greatly and stayed in touch with following graduation. Allen had promised Sacks an opportunity if and when he got a college head coaching job.
Allen had just finished working in the soon-to-be-defunct U.S. Football League and was pursuing the head job at Portland State.
"I won't be able to pay you much," Allen told Sacks at the time, "(but) if you want to do it, I'll hire you."
Sacks told Allen the pay didn't matter, and when Pokey was hired, so was Sacks. According to Sacks Allen approached former UM assistant Gary Ekegren - at that time coaching in Longview, Wash., and currently the head coach at Missoula Big Sky - but Ekegren chose not to go.
Sacks was hired as defensive line coach for the Vikings and stayed there with Allen for seven seasons until Pokey got the Boise State head job. Sacks tagged along in 1993 and coached at BSU for four seasons.
It was during that time that Allen contracted a cancer that would take his life. The last time Sacks was in Missoula was for Pokey's funeral in 1997.
Boise State hired a new staff and Sacks moved to Adams State College in Alamosa, Colo., where he coached for just one year. By that time he had established a lot of contacts in the coaching profession and one of them, Dave Baldwin, hired him as special teams coordinator and defensive line coach at San Jose State.
Despite the fact that the Spartans beat Stanford three times in the four years they were there Baldwin was let go and Sacks was looking again. But while in San Jose he had become acquainted with the general manager of the Arena Football League SabreCats who offered him a job with that team.
During the year Sacks served as SabreCats defensive coordinator he helped coach former Montana wide receiver Shalon Baker, who also saw duty as a linebacker. Sacks had coached against the Grizzlies when Shalon was playing at UM.
"It was fun to see Shalon and coach him and be around him," Sacks recalled. "He's just an absolute brilliant young man on the football field."
Sacks couldn't shake that college coaching desire, and after a year in the AFL he took a job at Nevada-Reno under then-head coach Chris Tormey in 2002. He's been there ever since and currently serves as special teams coordinator for the Wolf Pack, which opened the 2007 season with a resounding but not unexpected defeat at Nebraska.
In the middle of all the moves Sacks met Teresa and the two were married in 1988 in Portland. One year later they became the proud parents of Alexandra, now a freshman on the Nevada-Reno soccer team. And another year after that along came son Philip, a high school junior in Reno.
Barry and Teresa met at the wedding of Sacks' former UM teammate Arnie Rigoni, who married former UM volleyball star Wendy Hoyt, Teresa's roommate.
Sacks was recruited to UM by head coach Jack Swarthout shortly before his tenure at UM ended. Sacks ended up playing for new Griz head coach Gene Carlson.
He had been entertaining feelers from other schools as his high school career wound down, but when Swarthout finally put forth a solid offer, Sacks jumped on it. He remembers his first trip to Missoula vividly.
"I can remember arriving in Missoula for the first time and looking up the Hellgate Canyon and saying, 'my goodness,'" Sacks remembered.
He had some Montana connections. His mother was born in Bozeman and his grandmother in Livingston. His grandmother was raised in Missoula and lived next door to the original Greenough Mansion on Rattlesnake Creek before it was moved to Farviews.
"I had so much fun, and developed such great friends," Sacks said of his UM days.
Among those friends he still tries to stay in touch with are Bart Andrus, who now lives in Bigfork; fellow linebacker Kent Clausen, now in Spokane; Jim Hogan, now an assistant coach at Carroll College in Helena; and Rigoni, who still lives in Portland.
Sacks started his UM academic career as a radio-television major but figured out that what he really wanted to do was coach. So he switched his major to - and got his degree in - health, physical education and recreation, with a minor in speech and communications.
His decision to get into coaching was inspired mainly by Ekegren and Allen and his love of the game, and despite the urgings of others who said he would never amount to anything if he became a coach.
"I've always loved football," Sacks said. "I knew I wasn't going to play (after college). I was a runt. I was at the absolute peak of my career at that time. I knew it."
Sacks is in his 43rd year of either playing or coaching football.
"I just love being around the game and the people and everything," Sacks said. "I knew I couldn't keep playing it and had to do it in some respect or another.
"I wasn't going to be an official," Sacks went on. "I can't stand those guys."
Sacks isn't exactly sure where the motor that has driven him to succeed all of his life came from. But he dished out a clue.
"I think it burns at you that anybody would ever think that you couldn't do something," Sacks said. "They told me in high school I wasn't big enough to play linebacker, and all that ever did was piss me off, so I always wanted to make sure I picked out the biggest s.o.b. I could and at least hit him in the head."
Sacks now works with Nevada head coach Chris Ault, back for his third stint with the Wolf Pack.
"He's an absolute ball for me," Sacks said. "He knows how to win. He understands the climate of a football team, the climate of individuals in football. He understands what motivates people around him."
Sacks recognized the quality in Ault because he had seen the same thing in Pokey Allen years earlier.
"He could stick his finger in the air and understand the climate of a football team," Sacks said of Allen, "and I think coach Ault's the same way."
Sacks said he couldn't imagine what Ault - who now has coached college football in four different decades - was like as a younger coach, but he said he's mellowed during this latest run.
Sacks also downplays the possible problems that could come with coaching and playing in a city known for gambling. In fact, he said natives of Reno are much like people from Montana.
"They're very warm," he said. "They're very welcoming. They'll bend over backwards for you. It's a big small town. The fabric is fantastic."
One of his best UM memories was a 24-8 win over Montana State in 1978, the only win over the Cats in his four seasons in Missoula. He knows current UM coach Bobby Hauck quite well and does his best to keep track of his former team.
"It just makes me proud of my alma mater every time I look at the Internet and … keep track of their scores and what they're doing," Sacks said, "especially when they make the I-AA playoffs."
Sacks believes UM could make the jump to I-A, or FBS, football quite easily.
"I may pop off too much, but you compare Missoula to Logan, Utah (Utah State), there's no comparison." Sacks said. "Missoula's a better college town, better college atmosphere, and (has) more support.
"Or, for that matter, Moscow, Idaho," he added. "Missoula's a better town, a better place, a better college football venue."
Sacks seems to handle the task of being a parent of athletes with the right approach. All he told them was that they had made a commitment and needed to give it 100 percent.
"Second of all I tell them the greatest joy in my life is to watch them play," Sacks said, adding that putting a ball in their hands was the best gift he felt he could give them.
In the end Sacks still gives his UM days high grades for helping him get where he is today.
"It was a great education," Sacks said. "Professor Wilson (anatomy and physiology teacher Vince) … taught me … the beauty of learning.
"And also my years or perseverance and loyalty to my friends," he went on. "And the fact that the people of Missoula embraced me throughout those years and I really enjoyed that. I get a pitter-patter in my heart whenever I think about them."
How could they not embrace a little guy with a motor like that?
