Coach Glenn ready for practice
The University of South Dakota football team has a new face. That new face is Head Coach Joe Glenn, hired last November to replace Ed Meierkort.
Glenn comes with a USD background, as he is a 1971 graduate. Glenn played on the football team as a quarterback and wide receiver and was a captain during his senior season. He also comes with great deal of experience and a proven track record with over twenty years of coaching experience and a career record of 188-100-1.
Glenn said he is extremely excited to get the ball rolling for his first season at his alma mater.
“We’ve already done lots of red tape stuff, behind the scenes type of things,” Glenn said. “So right now I’m just super excited to get started. I’m really fond of the coaches and players I have inherited. It’s going to be a lot of fun.”
Glenn was hired was to help ease the transition into the Missouri Valley Conference, which the Coyotes will be entering next year.
“I’ve had a chance to coach at this level before so I will use that knowledge to help out with the transition,” Glenn said. “My style and leadership has worked in years past and I’m not going to do anything different.”
It also doesn’t hurt that he knows the area and knows what it takes to win.
“I have some Vermillion blood in me,” Glenn said. “I also have the experience that they probably were looking for.”
Glenn’s experience as a head coach dates all the way back to 1976, where as a 27-year-old Glenn took over as head coach for Doane College in Crete, Nebraska. After three successful seasons at Doane and Glenn moved on to bigger and better things working as an assistant coach for the University of Montana. Glenn’s next head coaching stint came in 1989, when he became the leader of a very successful Northern Colorado Bears team. In his ten years at Northern Colorado Glenn would lead the Bears to a record of 98-35, along with back to back Division II National
Championships in 1996 and 1997. Glenn then moved on to the University of Montana, where in three years had a record of 39-6.
His final coaching job was with the University of Wyoming. His six years in Wyoming weren’t quite as successful record wise as his other jobs, as the school was 30-41 in his tenure.
Glenn hopes to get back on the winning side of the ball as he takes over a Coyote team that went 6-5 last year and is losing key players such as quarterback Dante Warren and middle linebacker Adam Broders. But Glenn doesn’t see a reason why the Coyotes can enter the Missouri Valley Conference and be successful from the get go.
“I’m not about to re-invent the wheel. We have lots of good things already in place,” Glenn said. “ It’s going to start with our enthusiasm, discipline, and spirit. Hopefully all of that can show on the scoreboard.”
USD’s spring practices start up this Saturday with about a month of practices until the annual Red/White Spring scrimmage, which will be played on April 21.
Glenn is stepping into a job that won’t be easy, but from the looks of it he will be attacking the job head on looking for whatever it takes to win.
