LANDIS —Twenty-five years ago, an N.C. State assistant coach named Bob Boswell visited East Rowan High on a recruiting trip.
Boswell had come to Granite Quarry to talk to coach W.A. Cline about two All-State caliber athletes — a powerful lineman named Darrell Misenheimer and a talented running back named Rick Vanhoy.
Vanhoy would become the Rowan County Athlete of the Year for 1975-76. He was the whole package — a co-captain in all three major sports. A Shrine Bowl running back. A basketball player good enough to score 42 points against West Iredell (still the school record). A .434 hitter (second in the county) for the baseball team.
Boswell tried his level best but failed in his mission. He couldn’t entice either of the Mustang stars to join the Wolfpack. He returned to Raleigh empty handed, but he was impressed by Vanhoy. Even after Vanhoy signed with the Pack’s biggest rival — the UNCTar Heels.
“Rick was a nice kid,” says Boswell. “He grew up to be a very nice man.”
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Time flies, and now that “very nice man” is the head coach of the South Rowan High football team. This will be Vanhoy’s sixth year at the helm and it has been no easy road. The last three years, South has only won eight games total, although there’s no question a corner was turned late last season when the Raiders put together three straight league wins to make the 4A state playoffs.
Expect that upward trend in Raider fortunes to continue in 2000, at least in part, because of the addition to the South staff of that same man who recruited Vanhoy a generation ago.
Boswell carries the unofficial title of “helping with the defense.” But there’s no doubt in anyone’s mind — friend or foe — that he will have an influence light years beyond that of mere helper. If Boswell doesn’t shake things up at South, then Santa isn’t jolly.
At South’s practice on Thursday, Boswell’s voice was the loudest. Kids listen when Boswell speaks. And so do coaches. Because at age 63, Boswell is an encyclopedia of defensive knowledge. He is a living legend.
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Just a year after his unsuccessful recruitment of Vanhoy, Boswell was hired to pump life into the so-so football program at A.L. Brown High. It will come as a shock to youngsters, but for much of the ‘70s, Wonder football was nothing special.
Boswell quickly changed that. He brought weight training to Kannapolis. He brought unrivaled energy and enthusiasm. And he brought the perennial winning that transformed Kannapolis into one of the state’s premier football towns.
Boswell’s first team staggered home 2-8. Three years later, he was 11-1, producing NFLplayers like Ethan Horton and Lance Smith and pushing his team to a No. 2 ranking in the entire nation. In those days, the Wonders played 4A ball, but Boswell whipped the big-city bullies from Greensboro and Winston-Salem with ease and had his milltown boys contending for championships on an annual basis.
Boswell was the Shrine Bowl coach in ‘88, then left Kannapolis in the spring of 1989 to coach in South Carolina. But the groundwork had been laid. His successor, Bruce Hardin, won Brown’s first state title that fall. Wonder football hasn’t looked back.
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When Boswell retired in ‘99 and moved back to Kannapolis there was immediate speculation he would return to local football.
And so he has, although it is in the unfamiliar red and black of South, a school which stands single-digit miles from A.L. Brown. The rivalry between A.L. Brown and South is not as passionate as the one between Brown and Concord, but it is strong.
“I’m here at South, simply because South was the one that asked,” Boswell says. “(South principal Dr.) Alan King and Rick called and asked. That makes all the difference.”
A.L. Brown apparently did not ask, although it’s easy to see why.
The Wonders’ new head coach, Ron Massey, is a proven winner and a strong-minded individual, but it would have been difficult, at best, to have Boswell on his staff. That would have been something like Matt Doherty asking Dean Smith to sit on his bench as an assistant.
The other school that did seek Boswell’s expertise was Concord.
“(Concord coach) E.Z. Smith asked me to help and we’re very good friends, but I just couldn’t do that,” says Boswell. “That would have been too awkward in Kannapolis.”
Boswell’s availability was brought to Vanhoy’s attention by former Raider defensive coordinator and assistant principal Steve Beaver.
“We had talked half-serious, half-kidding with Steve about coming back and helping us out,” says Vanhoy. “And then Steve tells us that he ran into someone on the golf course that might be interested.”
That someone, of course, was Boswell. “I said, ‘My gracious, Bob Boswell!’” remembers Vanhoy. “It’s unusual, but I do know this — the kids are responding to him. We’re very fortunate. He’s going to make us a much better football team.”
The person who realizes that fact more than anyone else may well be Raider offensive line coach Larry Deal. Deal was South’s head coach during Boswell’s heyday at A.L. Brown. They bumped heads, shoulders and everything else in some momentous battles, playing overtime games three straight years (‘83-’85) in one unforgettable stretch.
“I respected Larry as an opponent,” says Boswell. “I hope he respected me.”
He did. “It was competitive to say the least,” says Deal with a smile. “Bob’s teams were the toughest, most well-prepared you were ever gonna see.”
Asked if it was going to be weird having Boswell on the same sideline 15 years later, Deal laughed.
“It might be strange to see Bob in the red and black,” he said, “but let me tell you, it’s a whole lot better than seeing him in the green and white.”
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This is going to work, mostly because Vanhoy may be the most ego-less head coach in the world. If South can improve to 6-5 or 7-4 this year, Vanhoy will care less if some people whisper that Boswell was the reason. Vanhoy just wants wins, not credit. He wants wins for his players, his loyal coaches, his school, his community.
Boswell wants those wins too. And not for any selfish reasons.
“I’m sure not here to win any plaques,” he said. “I’ve got a wall full. And I’m not here because I’m looking for a head job — please, don’t call me. I’m here because I like Rick and the coaches and because they’ve got great kids here. I enjoy coaching football and I love working with kids. When I’m coaching, I’m a kid again myself. I’m just happy to be a part of this.”
Boswell says that a perfect day is a morning at the golf course, followed by an evening of defensive drills with the Raiders.
“I’m just an old geezer now,” he grins, “just an old geezer having a good time.”
Some old geezer.
His walking interview concluded, Boswell breaks into a pretty respectable sprint across the Raider practice field. He’s already bellowing instructions before he reaches his troops 40 yards away. “Rip it up! Accelerate on contact! Get that head in there! Don’t blink those eyes! Yeah, now, you’re getting it!”
The Raiders hang on every word. Players and coaches.
And why not?
“The man’s record,” says Deal, “speaks for itself.”
Mike London