(Harlan) Football, basketball, track, and golf have all been coached in some capacity by Ken Carstens at Harlan. The now retired coach was a part of a lot of success with the Cyclones.
Carstens began his career at Griswold, but after two years he got drafted. In 1969 he got back into coaching and education in Harlan. “I probably wouldn’t have left Griswold because I enjoyed it there. It just so happened that a job popped open in the summer of 1969 and I called my superintendent and asked him if he had any pull with the Harlan superintendent and he got me an interview. It worked out well the way things happened. I guess I was just lucky to land where I did. Someone was looking out for me.”
Carstens had a pair of coaches that essentially served as father figures for him when he was growing up in Manning. He wanted to pay the favor forward, so he became a coach. “I had a junior high teacher who was also a coach Chuck Brotherton and a high school coach Dale Johnson. I come from a single parent and those were two guys I wanted to be like. They were both good people in my opinion. As I got older I realized that I probably did it as a payback. If I could make a difference in one person’s life like they did in mine I had done my duty.”
Head coach Curt Bladt built Harlan football into a dynasty, but guys like Bill Hosack, Russ Gallinger, Ken Carstens, and others were along for much of the ride. Carstens recalls a runner-up finish in 1981 catapulting everything. “The kids believed that they could get to the championship game. The next year we came from 14 down at half and won it. We were on a roll at that point. That became the standard. That’s what kids expected of themselves and that’s what we expected to. Our goal was not just to get to the state championship, but our goal was to win it.”
Track was the sport Carstens was a head coach of. The circumstances of how that came about were somewhat unique. “It was what my son loved to do. He loved to run. He was maybe all of 115 pounds coming out of 8th grade. He liked to run and he was good at it. I told the cross country coach he should try to recruit him and he looked at me like, ‘You want your kid to be a cross country kid instead of a football player?'”
So Coach Carstens made a deal with his son that he would be the head track coach if his son would go out for cross country instead of football. “I told him the next year I’d take the track job if he wanted to do cross country. He said, ‘I want to play for you dad.’ The track job came open and I said ‘I’ll take the track job so that way you can still play for me.’ So that’s how I became the head track coach.”
Head boys track coach was a role Carstens really enjoyed. “In track you have a different relationship with kids. In football I worked with defensive linemen and linebackers so it was a very small group. In track you really work with everyone.”
Carstens gave up his track duties in 2012 and waved goodbye to the football staff in 2015. Up until this past year he’s stayed busy as substitute teacher and now is getting to spent a lot of time with grandkids.
Photos Courtesy of Harlan Newspapers
https://soundcloud.com/hyoach/ken-carstens-why-i-coach
Previous Coaches
John Kesselring, Adair-Casey alum
Eric Maassen, (AHST grad) Sheldon
Jerome Hoegh, Atlantic grad (West Sioux)
Gaylord Schelling, Atlantic and Tri-Center
Chad Klein, Audubon Native (Kuemper Catholic and Boone)
In Memory of Bob Monahan, Audubon (Monte Riebhoff)
In Memory of Bob Monahan, Audubon (Steve Ahrendsen)
In Memory of Bob Monahan, Audubon (Scott Weber)
In Memory of Bob Monahan, Audubon (Curt Mace)
Chris Stimson, Elk Horn-Kimballton
Jan Jensen, Elk Horn-Kimballton alum
Seth Poldberg, EH-K grad and Guthrie Center coach
Trevor Gipple, (Griswold grad) SW Valley
Angie Spangenberg, Harlan and Red Oak
Eric Stein (Harlan grad) Iowa Central
Darrell Burmeister, Nodaway Valley
Lanny Kliefoth, Nodaway Valley
