Longtime Brookfield Central tennis coach dies
Dave Steinbach, one of the icons of high school tennis in the state, died Monday. He was 86.
Brookfield Central coach Jon Vogt announced the news on the team’s Twitter account Monday evening.
“Coach Steinbach, you will always be an absolute legend,” Vogt wrote. “Thousands of young men and women are fortunate for everything you contributed to their development. Anyone lucky enough to learn from your experience is better off as a tennis player and as a human being. Rest in peace.”
Steinbach retired as Central’s boys coach after the 2017 season and stepped down as the girls coach in July 2020. The risk that came with coaching during COVID-19 pandemic influenced his decision.
But even in retirement, he visited the tennis courts at Central on a regular basis. Sometimes he’d come out and talk with the players. Other times he’d sit in his car and watch practice.
“He worked constantly, stayed in touch with coaches and gave advice,” said Vogt, a former assistant. “He always wanted to know how everyone was doing and how the matches with the schools went.”
Steinbach spent 38 years coaching tennis at Brookfield Central, winning more than 500 matches for both the school’s boys and girls programs. His teams won 13 state championships, four boys and nine girls. Individually, three boys and three girls singles players/doubles teams were state champions.
“I’ve coached a lot of sports, but none of them pertain to life as much as tennis,” Steinbach told the Journal Sentinel in July 2020. “You get so many opportunities to reinforce how you’re going to handle success and how you’re going to handle failure and I think that is the most important part about the game of tennis.”