Amid the Sellout, Comeback and Huge Win, DeBoer Found Time for Former Players

The coach encouraged a dozen one-time Sioux Falls footballers to come out and share in the Oregon game.

One of the reasons Kalen DeBoer is so successful as the University of Washington football coach is he's a relationship-builder, a people guy, someone who cares.

He came to Montlake and immediately won over his inherited Husky players by gaining their trust and convincing them to train harder, believe more and win a lot more.

The thing about this DeBoer coaching connection is once it's in place, it doesn't end. 

Twelve former Sioux Falls football players were proof of this when they traveled to Seattle this past weekend to attend the UW-Oregon football team after receiving a call from their one-time coach.

DeBoer encouraged them to come out, telling them this game would be huge. He arranged for them to sit in his Husky Stadium private family suite. A day before the game, the  players and the coach were supposed to meet for 15 minutes during his hectic pregame activities, but DeBoer mades sure the impromptu reunion lasted for an hour and a half.

They won national championships together at the NAIA school, sweated together and formed a lifetime bond, one that DeBoer more than anyone goes to great lengths to maintain.

Even with DeBoer now coaching the nation's fifth-ranked team that has a 13-game win streak and plays in a 71,000-seat stadium, his players noticed no difference in the man. Same guy, same low-key ego, every reason to still like him.

"He hasn't changed a bit," said Jon Ryan, DeBoer's top receiver and an NAIA player of the year selection. "He's still a small-town guy from South Dakota."

These dozen former Sioux Falls players from DeBoer's 2009 team arrived in Seattle and were wandering through the UW tail-gating scene when they ran into Lynn Madsen, a one-time Husky defensive tackle and Aloha Bowl defensive MVP who played for the legendary Don James.

Madsen took them to the Big W club, to the pregame radio show, all around the Husky Stadium pre-kickoff activities, showing them the football landscape and how it comes together.

These Midwest visitors, all dressed in Husky sweatshirts and T-shirts on game day, had another chance to share in DeBoer football success and they left town with more good memories of a coach who made them want to play for him.

"I feel, honestly, that Washington is lucky to have him," Ryan said.

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