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Hedberg has all the right moves
The Husky football players spent most of the 2002 season proving people wrong.
Picked to finish no better than sixth by most members of the NCC media, they wanted to prove that they were not the same Huskies of the recent past. In the process, they turned into a very dangerous football team, one that many playoff teams were glad to see left out of the mix.
At the heart of the turnaround was head coach Randy Hedberg. After three consecutive losing seasons, Hedberg more than doubled his SCSU win total, from eight to 17, exorcising some of his own personal coaching demons. He freed himself of the now-infamous Scott Schmitz incident, earning the trust and respect of his players. Now, as his season of improvement is over, he is likely to be rewarded with a contract extension to continue what he’s got going.
“At this point, my intentions are to coach football at St. Cloud State next year and the year after,” he said. “I would hope that what we’ve done and all would warrant that, but we’ll see.”
He got a lot of help from his star players, but he also started to get more out of his role-players, which is key to success at any level of football.
“Like I told our players, we weren’t the most athletic team in all 11 games we played,” he said. “Of the nine wins we had, there were teams that were more athletic than us.”
But few teams proved to be as disciplined or as crafty as the Huskies, who baited teams into mistakes and capitalized on them all season long. Hedberg’s poker-facedness came out in his players, who kept an even-keel throughout the year, on the way to a 9-2 overall record and a 6-2 finish in the NCC.
They say that winning cures all ills, and that may well be the case here. But even in their losses, he made the correct decisions. The overtime loss at UNC came from an interception thrown at Ben Nelson while he was single-covered, and one less missed extra point in Mankato would have likely won them the game. He left no more room for second-guessing and it should pay dividends in the off-season. With a new football stadium on the way and another winning season in the cards, recruiting could start to become no sweat.
And now for the University Chronicle’s official/unofficial postseason awards show. Let’s move past the lame intro and get right to the meat of the ceremony.
Offensive Rookie of the Year: Running back Matt Birkel, no contest. The freshman snowplow didn’t even play in the Huskies’ first two games, but took the NCC by storm, rushing for 958 yards in only eight games, at a ridiculous 6.2 yards per carry. He also scored on an 88-yard screen pass against New Haven and a 93-yard kickoff return at Augustana.
Runner up: Wide receiver Ryan Koch, who established himself as a solid second-fiddle to Ben Nelson, catching 31 balls for 408 yards and a score.
Defensive Rookie of the Year: Acting free safety Chad Kruckman, who was pressed into service by an injury to 2001 tackles leader Matt Nicholson. Kruckman finished third on the team in tackles, with 66, and recorded three interceptions. He or Nicholson will likely be moved to cornerback with the graduation of Anthony McCoo.
Runner up: Defensive end Charlie Cosgrove. Cosgrove became a regular early in the season and paid dividends late, getting his first sack in the Huskies’ huge win over North Dakota and his second through fourth in the New Haven game, tying a school record.
Most entertaining individual play, offense or defense: Senior offensive tackle Joe Keller became the largest man in SCSU history to score a touchdown against South Dakota State, when he picked up a Keith Heckendorf fumble and found himself in the end zone nearly five minutes later.
Runners up: the end of Kody Dribnak’s 70-plus yard interception return at NDSU, Ed Deshazer’s catch, dribble and run against the Fighting Sioux, any of Ben Nelson’s touchdown catches.
Defensive MVP: After much consideration, a tie between the tackles, senior Jeremy Pilarski and junior Nick Peterson. Pilarski saved his best for last, recording 36 tackles and 10 tackles for loss. Peterson proved he has a nose for the ball, recovering two fumbles, intercepting a pass and registering 46 tackles and seven sacks. Most importantly, they anchored the line all season and had the first and last word on their opponents’ rushing attack. The word was usually no.
Offensive MVP: The most difficult to decide, as there are more qualified candidates than column inches remaining. The nod here goes to a combination of the offensive line and Birkel. Heckendorf and Nelson were lights-out for most of 2001, but the team struggled to a 4-7 finish. Harlon Hill candidate Heckendorf will tell you that he wouldn’t have thrown any of his 37 TD’s without his hogs, and Birkel’s arrival gave the offense a serious rushing game. In 2001, the Huskies rushed for 626 yards as a team, in 2002, Birkel ran for almost 1000 himself.
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