Casey Kolkman didn’t want the Heritage head football job.
“I wasn’t going to apply,” said Kolkman. “My life is good. I have a teaching job. I coach at Bishop Dwenger with some great kids and great coaches. I just have to show up and stop people (as defensive coordinator).”
That was the initial thinking by Kolkman when the Heritage position opened up upon the resignation of Nico Tigulis. As an alum of Heritage and a teacher in the building, it made too much sense to outsiders that Kolkman, who had turned around programs at North Side and Bluffton at previous stops, was the answer to resurrect the Patriots.
But it wasn’t as clear-cut as that.
“Even last year I had some head coaching opportunities, but I wasn’t interested when (son Alex) was still in high school,” Kolkman said. “The only one that there really was to consider was Huntington North, and my wife and I didn’t feel like that was right. We decided to stay at Bishop Dwenger, which is a really good place to coach with a really good group of men.”
Yet as Kolkman began to think it over, he saw an opportunity. His wife saw the same thing – a chance for Kolkman to make a difference in the way he did at his previous head coaching stops.
Heritage is still thought of as a rural school in southern Allen County, far away from the hustle and bustle of the big city.
But reality is different. The closing of Harding High School has seen an increase in the socioeconomic class of students that Kolkman connected with in his years at North Side – first as a teacher, then as the head coach of the football program from 2004-09.
Heritage is a melting pot of social classes, one that continues to deepen with every passing year. With Kolkman moving into physical education this past year, he was able to interact with many of the younger grades at Heritage. He was able to get to know them, see their personalities…and their struggles.
“Heritage has a large (English second language) program and the free and reduced lunch rates have steadily climbed, so it is similar to North Side in that sense,” Kolkman said. “When you have struggles, for whatever reason, sometimes the people involved just don’t recognize it, don’t see it. You can’t fix something you don’t see, even though you know there is a problem.”
It is these factors that eventually made Kolkman apply for and eventually accept the Heritage head football coach position. Sure, he wants to win football games with the Patriots, but he also feels like his duties transcend football. It is not arrogance, but rather the lessons he learned at previous stops as a coach.
There is no doubt that Heritage is in need of a makeover. The Patriots last won conference and postseason championships in 2012, but it feels like a lifetime ago. Enter Kolkman, who pointed North Side in the right direction, then did it again at Bluffton from 2010-13.
At both stops, Kolkman left the program in a better spot than when he took it over, but watched from afar as those teams continued to ascend without him. Coach Ryan Hall’s North Side team won 17 games in 2008-09, including an SAC regular-season championship. Meanwhile, Brent Kunkel has risen Bluffton into the conversation as one of the ACAC’s most consistent teams.
Kolkman was pleased to see his former teams’ success while also enjoying a run to a state title with Bishop Dwenger as defensive coordinator.
“I had the reputation as a guy who could fix a program and get it going, but could I coach at a high level?” Kolkman said. “It was nice to be at Bishop Dwenger and prove that.”
But now Kolkman wants to see things through at a program. He sees the opportunities at Heritage, a team that not so long ago was a perennial ACAC contender. Coaches will need to be hired, right down through the junior high and PAL programs. Expectations will need to be set.
But the biggest focus will be on effort.
“We all got a fresh start, myself included,” Kolkman said. “We have a lot of kids in the building that have written themselves off – maybe they have been cut from other sports team or are on academic probation. I have told them all that we all have a chance here, a second chance.”
For Kolkman, he has hit the ground running on his next rebuilding project.
One that at first he never realized he wanted.
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