A man for all seasons: Dave Houle of Mountain View High School in Orem, UT, has built a winning legacy based on a love for coaching and his players.

COACH: You are the most successful high school coach in America with a resume that includes 66--and possibly 67 or 68 by the time this interview is published--state championships in boy's and girl's cross-country, girl's basketball, and boy's and girl's track and field. You also coached boy's basketball for eight years. In addition, in 2000 you were inducted into the National Federation of State High School Associations' Coaches Hall of Fame. What has been your recipe for success?

HOULE: I really preach the journey. I try and tell them at the beginning of the season that this is a chapter in your book of life. We just want to make it as happy and as pleasant as we possibly can. That doesn't mean that it has to end in a state championship. What it means are the friendships you gain on the team, the hard times, and the good times.

My whole ideal is that I don't want the kids to be All-Americans on the court or the track and a pinhead at home. I ask them if they made their beds when they come to practice. I make sure that my assistants and I tell them that we love them every day after practice. And I make sure to tell them to tell their parents that they love them and to thank them for providing the opportunities that they have. My late mom, Bev, never let my brothers and sisters or myself leave the house without telling us she loved us. She also wanted us to be good and mind our teachers every single day.

I don't have any magical offenses or defenses or any magic dust I sprinkle on the track. All I want is for my players to think it is a great opportunity to play for Mountain View. And make the most of that opportunity.

COACH: Coaching cross-country/track definitely runs in the Houle family. Your eldest brother, Mark, coaches high school in Minnesota. Your brother, Kirk, and son, Davy, are both coaches at Mountain View. Brothers Scott and John coached at neighboring Orem High before moving on to Utah State; brother Eric heads the track program at Southern Utah University; and your brother-in-law, Chip Lake, is the former head coach at Snow Canyon High in Utah and now coaches high school basketball and track in Arizona. Even your daughter, Starre, is taking a coaching class at Utah State. How do you explain that common bond?

HOULE: I don't know. People ask us that all the time. My dad was a biochemist. He wasn't a coach. My mom was a stay-at-home mom. I guess it all started when my brother, Mark, returned from military service in Vietnam. He went into coaching and teaching because I told him how much I loved it. I coached my younger brothers and when they went to college, they got the coaching bug. We'll sit around during Thanksgiving and Christmas and say, "How did we all get here?" Everybody just loves it.

COACH: You have been coaching on the scholastic level for 27 years, including 24 at Mountain View. How have you been able to maintain your consistency for nearly three decades, especially with the evolution of the student-athlete during that period and all the diversions available to them today?

HOULE: Athletes are changing. In our day, when we played, you were given salt tablets and water was a weakness during football practice. That's totally different from what we do now. Now you have to deal with the Xbox and Play Station. Kids can stay home and build a football player and be that football player on their TV screen.

I gave a talk at a big business conference and I said, "You sell a product and you make money doing that, and that's awesome. But try selling to 14-and 15-year-olds that, for cross-country, they have to run 10 to 15 miles a day and they're going to enjoy it. You have to be a pretty good salesman to do that." To be a coach today, you have to stay up on things and you better evolve. It starts with going to the junior highs' and trying to talk kids into running when coaches use running as a punishment. You have to teach them that it isn't a punishment.

My mind changes from being a cross-country coach to being a basketball coach. Basketball players are not prima donnas, but they have a different thought process than cross-country runners. You have to get them to believe in the cause, get them to believe in what we are trying to accomplish. Nowadays, it isn't the [George] Patton way. It isn't yelling and screaming. It is getting them to see a vision and letting them know they are part of that vision. You also have to let each player know that they are the cogs and without them it doesn't work. And it doesn't matter if it's the 100th kid on your cross-country team.

COACH: How would you describe your coaching philosophy? Does it vary from sport to sport or does it carry the same message?

HOULE: It carries the same message but it also varies from sport to sport. How I coach track is different from how I coach basketball. I have an assistant, Steve Rivelli, who has been with me for almost 20 years. He said, "Dave, I've noticed that you are more strict in basketball than you are in track." But you have to be. Track is a team sport but it is also an individual sport. At the end of the year you have a multitude of things to deal with on a track team. The seniors are getting senioritis. The juniors and sophomores have already played football, basketball, wrestling, or whatever. At the end of the year everyone is tired.

When I coach basketball, no one is late to practice. It starts right on time. But with track, I'll give them a week off from basketball to recover or get it out of their system. If you are as strict on a track team as you are on a football or basketball team, you are going to lose kids. I make sure I coach track with a lot of enthusiasm and let the kids know they are important.

COACH: What are your thoughts about 'specialization' on the high school level?

HOULE: I think a kid should experience and enjoy as much as they can in high school. I had Leif Arrhenius who set national records in the hammer throw and discus, but he also played football. Then he said, "Coach, I just want to work on the disc." I have a girl who wants to play college basketball and she is a volleyball player. I face that all the time. But I try to get them to enjoy their high school years with other coaches and other sports. I think that's why our school has done so well because we share athletes.

COACH: What sport, aside from the three that you currently coach, intrigues you the most from a teaching aspect and why?

HOULE: I've always admired wrestling because of how hard those kids work and what they give out. I always think about those kids during Christmas and Thanksgiving because they have to watch their weight while we go and gorge ourselves. And how hard they actually work for those nine minutes that they wrestle.

Football intrigues me because of all the different skills. It reminds me of track. You have to know the blocking schemes. You have to know the different defenses you are going to face. You have to know how to coach the receivers, while someone else is coaching the quarterbacks, and someone else is coaching the running backs. Then there's the offensive line. Someone has to coach the center because it all begins with the snap of the ball. To work on all of that detail and actually have it come together really intrigues me--having teenagers all on the same page.

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COACH: Performance-enhancing drugs have been a huge sports story in the wake of the steroid scandal in professional baseball. Do you believe in testing on the high school level?

HOULE: Yes. I think steroids are prevalent in every state, including ours. There are a kids who you can tell are on steroids. You just don't blow up like that. I am a big fan of the records that Babe Ruth and Roger Maris set. But if you've used steroids to break those records, personally I don't think they should count. We, as coaches, have all gone through the periods when creatine and supplements were big. But I am at the point where I wish they would do random testing on the high school level because that's where we are most vulnerable. They see their heroes doing it and then they do it. In the end, it's not worth it. And nobody can tell you that it is when you lose that person.

COACH: Tell us about your childhood? Where were you born? Where did you grow up?

HOULE: I was born in Honolulu, HI. My dad, Martin, was in the Navy. Then we lived in Bozeman, MT for eight years. But I grew up on an Army base in Dugway, UT. You had to have your garbage cans out at a certain time and after they were collected, they had to be back in your yard within 30 minutes. It was a strict environment. Some people think that's how I became so regimented. You could be in the middle of a Little League game and if it was time for the flag to come down, the cannon would go off and all the cars had to pull over on the side of the road. The games would stop and you would stand at attention.

I came from a family of 11. We lived in a three-bedroom home with one bathroom. Now imagine trying to get ready for school with five sisters who have to curl their hair and put their makeup on and you only have one sink, one outlet, and one shower? So you learn to adjust and adapt. That's how I learned to deal with girls.

COACH: Where did you attend high school and college? What sports did you play?

HOULE: I went to Dugway High. In the center of the Army base, there was a high school and elementary school. You had to have a military ID to enter the base. There were armed guards at the gate. When schools used to come and play us they had to get off the bus so it could be searched. I played football, cross-country, basketball, track, and baseball. It was a small school of 180 students so you participated in whatever sport was going on at the time.

I started off at Dixie College in St. George, UT, where I played football and ran track. I was a kicker and receiver. I couldn't catch a cold but I was pretty good at field goals and extra points. Then I went on to Southern Utah in Cedar City and ran track and cross-country. That's where all of my brothers, except for Mark, went to college.

COACH: When did you decide to become a coach? Have you ever entertained the idea of coaching on the collegiate level?

HOULE: I remember when I was a little boy back in the ninth grade and I was sitting in the coach's office. I picked up a copy of Scholastic Coach magazine and wondered, "How cool would it be to be in this magazine?" Now, I am in it. I still have that issue to this day. Matter of fact, I looked at it a couple of months ago. I knew I was never a good enough athlete but I used to dream of winning just one state championship as a coach.

There isn't enough money on this planet that I would do anything else. When I was 13-years-old, my dad, who was president of the local Little League, gave me a team to coach because the sergeant who was supposed to coach the team was shipped out. I spent that night writing and rewriting their names and positions and numbers on my notepad until it looked perfect. From that day on, that's what I knew I wanted to do in life. My high school coach, George Bruce, gave me the 7th and 8th grade boy's basketball team to coach when I was a senior. And I absolutely loved it.

I have been offered the head positions at different universities every year. It comes to this: We sit down as a family and vote. If my wife and kids want me to coach college, I will. Now with my kids grown up and going into coaching and my wife and I having an empty nest, I am entertaining possible coaching jobs.

COACH: Who has had the most influence on your coaching career?

HOULE: Right now, in my life, the one who makes the most difference is my wife, Laura. She keeps my head above water and helps me continue to coach. I've known my wife since we were in second grade. We got married after one year of college. She knows me. The person you love inspires a lot of things that you do. And she inspired me.

My football coach at Dugway, Coach Bruce, who is still there, had a tremendous influence on why I went into coaching. He's been coaching for 41 years. He's the winningest boy's basketball coach in the state. Obviously, my mom and dad instilled my philosophy of caring for the kids I coach. I also learned from them the importance of doing charity work and community service. I never coach a team that doesn't provide some sort of community service.

And my track coach at Southern Utah, Dr. Steve Lunt, gave me his time every day and answered my questions about all the track events and workouts. He was an incredible resource.

COACH: What are some of the things you have incorporated into your programs at Mountain View to keep the athletes interested and focused?

HOULE: I sat my son and daughter down all throughout their careers, and even to this day, and bounce things off of them. And I ask them, "From your perspective, in today's world, what will make practice or games or what I tell kids most effective? How can I relate to the kids?" Starre would tell me things like, "Dad, girls are very self-conscious. No matter how skinny they are, they like to wear baggy shorts." Or Davy would say, "Dad, you should start every practice with a joke." I love to talk to my kids who are in touch with kids about coaching kids.

COACH: What is the state of high school cross-country and track and field in the U.S.?

HOULE: It goes on a rollercoaster a little bit. But I think it's alive and well. I think that more and more kids are getting involved. I see it in our state. Over the last 10-15 years, cross-country has grown in Utah and I'd like to think that Mountain View had something to do with that. At some schools, they're getting as many kids out for cross-country as they do for football. That used to be unheard of. I've had more than 180 kids come out for our cross-country team. At Orem High they had 60. In the city of Orem alone there are almost 300 kids participating in cross-country. That's awesome. When you go to the nationals in Oregon and see the Alan Webb's and those kinds of kids, it's a good feeling.

Kids need to get outside more and not become the best Xbox player in the city. I remember when the Presidential Fitness Award patch was the coolest thing to get. They hardly push that anymore.

COACH: What events have been the strong points of the Mountain View cross-country and track and field teams during your tenure?

HOULE: In track and field it's definitely been distance. There have been years we have won the state track championship because of the mile and two-mile. That's not to demean what we have done in the weights and field events. One thing in your program has to be strong. And every year we have a chance because of our distance events. In cross-country, our strength is in our numbers.

COACH: Do you incorporate any special training sessions to keep your athletes in peak condition? We would think that the elevation in Utah has helped.

HOULE: Our advantage is the altitude. We do hill training and a lot of it. I am also a believer in speed and agility training such as plyometrics. The disadvantage is the weather. In California and Texas you can sprint year-round. That's why their sprinters are so good. But in Utah you're going to have, at best, six good months to sprint without the chance of pulling a muscle because it is so cold. I also preach to our kids to eat three good meals a day and drink plenty of fluids.

COACH: How has the role of a high school coach changed since you began your career? Would you agree it has become more challenging?

HOULE: In some ways it hasn't changed and that is because kids look at their coaches as the closest thing to a parent they have. So we, as coaches, have a responsibility to make sure those kids see you in a role that someday they would aspire to be. But it's also gotten tougher because in today's world you have to be a doctor, a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a mother and father, you've got to know when to be tough and when to coddle, and you have to make sure to be a good listener because there will be times when you will be the only person they talk to. You have to have your kids' best interests at heart. You have the power to create great people if you approach it the right way.

No one can love coaching more than me. They can love coaching as much. I go to bed thinking about it and I wake up thinking about it.

THE HOULE FILE

Overall Current Coaching Record 1185-96 (93%) *

(24 years at Mountain View High School, UT; 2 yrs. Carbon High, UT; 1 yr. Milford High, UT)

Girl's Basketball: 372-36

Girl's Track: 249-16

Girl's Cross-Country: 221-11

Boy's Cross-Country: 207-18

Boy's Track: 120-15

All-Star, All-American Games: 16-0

66 State Championships (1977-2004) *

Girl's Track: 17

Girl's Cross-Country: 16

Boy's Track: 11

Girl's Basketball: 11

Boy's Cross-Country: 10

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Editor's Note: Houle has an opportunity to capture his 67th and 68th State title following the Mountain View boy's and girl's track season, which was still ongoing at the time of this interview.

* as of March 29, 2005.