Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
DeBusk ‘luckiest man’ as he reflects on long career
Thousands have walked the halls at Springdale High, but few — if any — have represented the school’s “Super S” logo more than Dennis DeBusk, a football coach, director of football operations and assistant athletic director who announced last week he’ll retire in May after 23 years with the district.
His announcement prompted an onslaught of well-wishes from friends and former colleagues like Pete Joenks, who worked with DeBusk for 21 of those 23 years at Springdale.
“In all that time, I can say without reservation that he always put kids first,” said Joenks, a former principal at Springdale High and now an assistant superintendent at Prairie Grove. “Coach DeBusk was as competitive as anyone I have ever known. But he also understood he was working with young men and women who were still learning about life and making mature decisions. They knew coach DeBusk had a passion for wanting his athletes to succeed, both on and off the field.”
DeBusk helped develop plenty of winners at Springdale, including the 2005 football team that went 14-0 and finished as high as No. 2 in the national rankings. But helping even troubled athletes to be better has always been a priority for DeBusk, who began a 47-year career as a coach and educator at Heber Springs in 1972.
“I’ve always believed you don’t treat all kids the same because some kids need different things,” DeBusk said. “You have to adjust to the kids and their needs because of their family situation and what’s going on in their life. Years before, it was more of a family-oriented situation with the kids, but there are more split families now. Some of them need a pat on the back, and some of them need a kick in the butt on occasion. They’ve always needed that.”
Young people can ask for plenty and receive nothing but not with DeBusk. Brett Hobbs has seen how DeBusk relates to young people and tried to help from the time Hobbs was a player at Springdale until Hobbs’ current position as defensive coordinator for the Bulldogs.
“He was one of those coaches who was easy to approach and talk to,” said Hobbs, who graduated from Springdale in 2000. “You also knew that he was going to hold you accountable. For over these 23 years he’s been a face for this program, and he’s going to be missed tremendously.”
DeBusk graduated from Heber Springs High School in 1966 and the University of Central Arkansas in 1971. He spent 16 years as a coach at Heber Springs, including 12 years as a head coach, before moving on to Shiloh Christian, where he led the Saints in football for eight years. He then began his longest tenure at Springdale, where he worked on both sides of the ball with such notable coaches as Jarrell Williams, Gus Malzahn and Eli Drinkwitz, a former Springdale assistant who is now the head coach at Appalachian State.
Though vastly different personalities, DeBusk said they all had a common thread that made them successful.
“They were all about detail,” said DeBusk, who has served as an assistant athletic director with Springdale for 13 years. “Jarrell could tell you what everybody did on a certain play as soon as it was over. You’d go back and check the film and see he was right most of the time. Gus had the same thing. Eli, too. Where I had to process things and watch film, they knew already what had happened.”
DeBusk said he and his wife, Paula, have not yet made any definite plans on how they’ll spend their retirement. He mentioned a possible road trip to Auburn, Ala., to watch Malzahn coach the Tigers or a trip to Boone, N.C., to watch Drinkwitz lead his new team at Appalachian State. But however he decides to spend his free time, DeBusk said the memories and friendships he’s made during a career that spans nearly half a century will continue to bring a smile to his face.
“I think about the time Lou Gehrig stood up in Yankee Stadium and said ‘Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth,’” DeBusk said. “That’s how I feel about this. I’ve been able to do things I’ve wanted to do for 47 years, and I’ve met a lot of great people along the way. What more could a person ask for?”