12A
Friday, December 8, 1989 / University Daily Kansan
Haack shows fire as cool competitor
Softball coach Kalum Haack advises freshman pitcher Jill Baliew
E. Joseph Zurgu
By Gene King
Kansan sportswriter
Take some intensity, a burning desire to win, and throw in a few softer qualities and the end result is Kalum Haack, Kansas' softball coach.
In his second season at the helm of the Jayhawk squad, he has already instilled into the women on his softball team the same kind of intensity that he exuded as a collegiate football player.
In the fall season, the Jayhawks lost only three games and won 16.
"I don't think we should have lost any. I know I'm "greedy when it comes to that."
Intensity not only rules his coaching but his everyday life.
"To be successful, the more intent you are, the more likely you are to strive for perfection." Haack said. "I want to win real bad."
Haack, one of two boys in his family, grew up in Hempstead, Texas, where he was a stand-out athlete at Hempstead High School.
His toughness came early, especially with a name like Kalum. He that his parents got the name from the credits at the end of a movie.
Perhaps the biggest influence on Haack was his father, Charles, or "Butch" to most people.
One of the biggest thrills for Haack was when he played on the same softball team with his father during the summer.
Haack said that his father taught him to be competitive when he was young and that a lot of mistakes should not to be tolerated.
"I felt he was hard on me at the time," Haack said. "He would make me so mad at times. But I realize now that it was good for me. He wanted me to be the best that I could be.
"There is nothing wrong with being competitive."
Haack took that competitive eagel and carried it through his collegiate football career at Sam Houston State, in Huntsville, Texas.
He was an all-conference linebacker and entertained thoughts of playing professional football, but he was too small, he said.
Haack began his collegiate coaching career as an assistant softball coach at Sam Houston in 1980. He then went to coach at Memorial
Parkway Junior High School in Katy, Texas, for one year.
Haack got his first taste or the Big Eight Conference when he became an assistant softball coach at Nebraska in 1983.
His love for football resurfaced
Haack got his first college softball head coaching job at his alma mate, Sam Houston, in 1986, before coming to Kansas in 1987.
when he became a defensive end coach at Katy Taylor High School, also in Katy, Texas.
Impulsiveness and a proposal
Intensity surrounds Haack. His wife, Leslie, is just as intense, and the two have had some heated battles. Neither would elaborate.
The two met while she was a freshman pitcher at Sam Houston during Haack's first stint there.
When Haack went on to coach at Nebraska, Leslie Haack and three other players followed.
"I hated him when he was the coach," she admitted. "We would hate it when the head coach would leave, putting Kalum in charge."
"I was homeschied for Texas when I went to Nebraska," Leslie Haack said. "He realized I wasn't happy. Kalum was from Texas, and he was lonely. That was probably one of the reasons we started dating.
Even though the two clashed at times, that perhaps was one ingredient for the attraction.
The two dated in secret for just two and a half months before Haack popped the question.
"On our first date we went dancing, and I called him Coach Haack all night."
"No one knew about us until we announced our engagement," she said.
They were at Grandmother's, a bar in Lincoln, Neb., on Dec. 29, 1984, when he proposed. He asked her over the public address system in the bar and had the waitress bring the ring to their table.
"He is always doing impulsive things, more so than people think. It kind of makes me nervous. He will come home with roses, and he leaves me notes all the time," she said.
Leslie Haack, a student in the education program at KU, said that she would be happy with Lawrence and that they needed to stay here for a long time.
She said that it had been an adjustment for her, though, and that she missed the beaches in Texas.
She said that she was ready to stay in one place for a while.
"I have moved six times in the last five years," she said. "We bought a house and are ready to make Lawrence our home."
One reason that Haack and his wire are willing to make Lawrence their home has to do with Haack's desire to build the Kansas softball program into a winner, not just in the conference but on the national level.
On the road to victory
During his first season at Kansas, the Jahyhaws went 33-32.
"As a coach, he is tough ano harsh," Leslie Haack said. "You have to learn to match his intensity."
The women who play for Haack do so with some hesitation. On the field, he is a menacing sight.
During one game, a Kansas player stole second with a runner on third and was thrown out. While she was jogging off the field, Haack stopped because he was expected to make the point clear that he was unhappy with her effort.
Haack immediately pointed out the fact that if the one player had not been thrown out at second, she, too, would have scored.
The player walked into the dugout and sat down. A few pitches later, the batter got a single, scoring the runner from third.
This happened in the bottom of the sixth Inning with the Jayhawks winning 6-0.
Emotion on the field
Gayle Luedke played one season for Haack and now is a student assistant coach. "Some of the girls don't know how to approach him due to his intensity on the field," Luedke said.
"Only a few of the players are actually scared of him."
Haack coaches with positive reinforcement as well, Luedke said.
"He emphasizes the positive. He points out the things you are doing wrong, but when you make a good play, he gets excited about it.
"You feed off of his emotions." she said.
"The first year, there was a lot of turnover among the team," she said.
Leslie Haack said she could see that some of the players were intimidated by her husband on the field.
Luedke pointed out that some of the younger players were more apt to shy away from the coach.
"Some of the freshmen seem to be
more apprehensive around Coach Haack," she said.
Robanna Braizer, pitcher for Haacea the last two years, said that he was hard to get to know on the field but that she "has all the respect in the world for him."
Haack's intimidating demeanor on the field not only gets across to the opposing team, but also to his own team.
"He is very intimidating to a lot of us." Brazier said. "You don't know what to expect.
"His first year here, he was an intense, intimidating person. But, this last year, you could see he was not as harsh."
Mellowing out
His wife could see that too.
But there are two sides to every coin.
"He has mellowed since he has been at Kansas," Leslie Haack said. "He knows he has the players with the athletic ability he needs to be a winning team."
Haack has his soft side off the field, too.
Luedke has seen both sides of Haack, the coach and the person.
"He is funny and fun to be a roarer," I lauded said. "I wish that all the players were able to see this side of him."
With his team on the winning track, Haack now can concentrate on the quest for a Big Eight title.
"He's committed to this program." Lester Haack said.
"He said it would take three recruiting classes before he had the team he wanted to take it all the way. Things seem to be on track."
Haack said that after he had established himself as a "perennial power" in NCAA softball, he would like to move on to administration of college athletics.
"I would like to be an athletic director someday," he said, "I can't coach forever. It would be a nice change and a step up."
But for now, he is concentrating on bringing KU another national club that was founded by black and everyone associated with almost and Kansas softball says he can.
The bottom line, Luecked said, is that "he just loves to win."
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