Rod Winland: Appreciation for a long coaching and teaching career

It’s kind of hard to imagine Rod Winland not coaching at some level of local sports anymore. Coaching has been a huge part of his life for nearly his entire life.

His father, Ralph, was a coach, as was his older brother Tim. Younger brother Pat is still coaching. Rod Winland has worn that whistle for some 30 years.

But retirement has called for the longtime local special education teacher, and while he absolutely loves coaching, his time as a coach is over, at least for now.

The son of Ralph and Robyn Winland, Winland is a 1989 graduate of Lovell High School, where he was a three-sport athlete, and he also excelled in baseball during the summer. He was an all-state quarterback and safety and was named the Northwest Conference player of the year. He also excelled in basketball and track and field, and he loved playing American Legion baseball.

Winland attended Northwest College and went on to then called Eastern Montana College (now MSU-Billings) and earned his degree in special education with an endorsement in elementary ed, graduating in 1994.

He did his student teaching at Byron Elementary School, thenwas hired by School District No. 1 and bounced between the elementary school and Rocky Mountain High School, where he also coached under Ben Smith for football and brother Tim for boys basketball during an era when Rocky Mountain was winning multiple state titles in both sports.

Winland was named the head girls basketball coach at RMHS in 1996 and held that position for six years. The Lady Grizz were successful, and Winland recalled battling Lovell in those days and playing the Lady Bulldogs for the state championship in 2000. Rocky beat Wright in the first round and Big Horn in the semifinals, then fell to Lovell in the championship game, 64-55.

“Bob (Geiser, Lovell head coach) and I had a lot of good battles throughout our tenure,” Winland said.

Winland was twice named 2A Northwest Coach of the Year, he recalled.

As for his special education teaching, Winland moved to a variety of District One schools throughout his career, depending on the need, teaching at Cowley Elementary, Rocky Mountain Middle School in Deaver, the new Rocky Mountain Elementary school and in recent years Rocky Mountain Middle/High School.

Through all of those stops, he continued to coach, loving every minute of it: middle school boys and girls basketball, middle school football, high school football, volleyball and boys and girls basketball.

“I’ve coached every year since day one,” he noted.

He also officiated for 18 years.

“I never coached baseball, but I would have to say baseball is probably my favorite sport, and I’d say that’s just because of the good memories that I have of the coaches at the time.”

He named Scott Murphey, Bruce Moats, John Lee Mangus, Keith Russell and Grit Despain as the baseball coaches he remembers fondly. The Winland boys would haul brick for their uncle John Strom or throw hay all day, then use their tired arms again for baseball in the evening.

“That’s the Gen X generation. I kept telling my boys, and they didn’t believe me,” Winland said. “When we had two-a-days, we’d have practice in the morning, and then we’d go haul hay to make some money at, like, 10 cents a bail.”

A love of coaching

Winland said he always enjoyed coaching girls, adding that girls work harder than boys in his experience, and he loved the strategy of coaching.

“I like the strategy. I like trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together, so to speak, to have a successful team,” he said. “I just liked to see it when the girls found what they were good at, and then they were able to translate it out on the court and (later) when I see them now as adults.”

Though seemingly calm and composed on the outside, Winland said a competitive fire burns inside, perhaps forged by the many successful seasons Lovell and Rocky Mountain enjoyed during his playing days and early in his coaching career.

“I was very competitive in my younger days, maybe not as restrained as I am now,” he said. “But, you know, going from Lovell High School and the winning tradition there, and then going into the 90s and winning, and then as these years went on it was tough to realize that you lose to teams that you’ve never lost to before. But everything’s a cycle. And, you know, for a long time Rocky was at the top of the cycle.”

As much as he cares about students through coaching, Winland has also cared as a special education teacher, and he has loved his career in special ed. And much like coaching, it’s about building relationships and connecting, he said.

“It takes building a relationship with the kids,” he said. “You know, I know a lot of people will ask me what I do, and I say, ‘Well, I teach special ed.’ And they say, ‘Well, you must have patience.’ And I said, ‘No, it’s not. It doesn’t take patience. It takes the ability to make a meaningful relationship with the kids.’”

And how does he work with the students?

“I think the best thing is to not criticize their dreams and to tell them that sometimes it’s OK that we don’t work on assignments, that we just sit and talk about how things are going in their life, and that not everybody’s track in life is to go on to college, that there’s a lot of successful people that work in the trades or work locally. I think that’s one thing that I see most about education is the lack of emphasis on the trades. And I wish that the trades would be something that’s talked about and promoted as early as elementary school.

“I think there’s a lot of opportunity for the boys to learn a trade, you know, plumbing, mechanics, work on a farm, but as far as the girls go, I’ve always been frustrated that there’s nothing for them to go into except cosmetology or to be a CNA. And, you know, we do welding in the school. We do ag, wood shop. So my question is, ‘Why don’t we do cosmetology? Or teach a CNA class?’ And a lot of kids need to take those in the school setting where it’s structured, so when they graduate, they can go right into the hospital specifically as a CNA.”

Looking back over the years, Winland said one of his biggest disappointments was the hard feelings in Byron caused when the new middle/high school was built in Cowley, with several families choosing to send their students to Lovell following the decision to build in Cowley rather than Byron.

“We lost a lot of good families from Byron,” he said. “I think, for me, that is one thing that really sticks out in my career. It was a sad time, because I knew a lot of those (kids) and coached a lot of those kids” who chose to “transfer to Lovell instead of going to Cowley.”

“I mean, it’s a nice school (in Cowley), and it’s really hard to believe it shouldn’t have been (there). It’s a perfect spot, and it’s got a great football field, but (interpersonally) it was hard.”

Another occasional disappointment is the rivalry with Lovell when it turns to animosity. He said he sees it as an official, as well as a coach.

“I’ve always just wanted both schools, both towns, just to be happy for the other town’s success,” he said. “A lot of my good friends and high school kids that I’ve coached (are from Lovell), like Shane Durtsche. I grew up with Shane, and he’s coaching, and it’s nice to see him be successful and talk to him.”

He said he also loves when local players return home to teach and coach, citing Jessee Wilson as an example of a student athlete who has returned to give back to his school and his community.

Missing the students

Winland said he will truly miss coaching. In his final year he was an assistant high school football coach, working as the quarterbacks coach and junior varsity offensive coordinator, and his final assignment was as an assistant middle school boys basketball coach. He was also an RMMHS athletic director for the last 12 years, organizing all of the Grizzly scheduling at both the middle school and high school level.

“The hardest thing about the retirement was not submitting my resignation letter as a teacher but hitting that send button resigning as assistant football coach,” he said. “And obviously I’ll miss teaching. There are a few students that I’m concerned about that maybe I left them a little early. I’m sure they’ll be fine, because Betsy (Sammons, principal) especially, is very cognizant or aware of those kids.”

He said he does lament the time it took to fill out compliance paperwork for special education, noting the paperwork time could be better spent “helping improve student achievement.”

One person Winland said has been a mentor during his career is Joe Davis, a longtime coach and former principal at Rocky schools, calling Davis the most constant and supportive person throughout his teaching and coaching career and even as a friend.

“He’s just always a good person to go get advice from,” Winland said. “He’s never critical. I think everybody else is kind of level, probably on the same playing field, OK, but Joe’s one who could definitely stand above everybody.”

Looking ahead, Winland said he is currently working at the Powell golf course in maintenance and as assistant groundskeeper, and he’s also looking forward to spending more time with his kids and grandkids: Hannah Winland, a school counselor in Cody; Madeline Kite, a registered nurse in Powell; Brian Crawford of Iconic Auto Body in Lovell; Jett, an apprentice electrician at Bar T Electric; Elizabeth Bowers, a CNA at North Big Horn Hospital; and Ethan Crawford, who is working on his pilot’s license, along with son-in-law Brandon and daughter Willow Kite, daughter-in-law Trecelle Crawford, son-in-law Derrick Bowers and daughter-in-law Kiara Crawford. Wife Jodi is the Rocky Mountain school nurse and also works at the New Horizons Care Center.

Winland said it’s wonderful to have all of his Winland family, his kids and his grandkids close to home, and he said the family loves to go boating during the summer and hunting in the fall.

He will, however, miss that coaching whistle.