1 September 2023
Shortly after taking over as head football coach at the University of St. Thomas in January 2008, Glenn Caruso went to work to add to a staff that consisted of only two full-time assistant coaches.
As an offensive specialist, Caruso identified the need to hire a defensive coordinator. He put together a list of a dozen potential candidates and began reaching out to gauge interest.
He knew the type of defense he wanted to run — a three-linemen, four-linebacker scheme modeled after the one used by North Dakota in its 2001 national championship team, a defense Caruso coached against as offensive coordinator at North Dakota State.
Caruso also knew that the right hire would be able to take the fundamentals of that defense and make it his own.
Before long, Caruso whittled down his list to three candidates to be interviewed on campus, including a long shot named Wallie Kuchinski, a young defensive coordinator at Division II
Truman State, and a native of Blaine looking to come home.
While lacking experience, Kuchinski impressed Caruso with his eagerness to learn and an open-mindedness that set him apart during the interview process.
“That told me everything I needed to know,” Caruso said. “A guy who could say that, ‘If there is a better way, then who am I to not take advantage of that?’
“That’s when I started falling in love with him.”
As their 16th season together begins Saturday with the Tommies’ season opener against Black Hills State at O’Shaughnessy Stadium, Caruso and Kuchinski will continue to celebrate what has become an unbreakable bond. Along they way, they have enjoyed a level of success that has drawn national attention.
The Tommies’ winning ways in the Pioneer Football League the past two seasons have added significantly to their respective resumes, with Caruso and Kuchinski each long convinced that one could not have done it without the other.
“Man to man, it’s as close to a brotherly relationship that I’ve had in football,” Caruso said. “The difference is the emotional connection you feel when you transition from peer to brother. It’s that idea of, ‘I want to work so hard because I want him to be proud.’ ”
Offered Kuchinski: “He has a wealth of knowledge, and I’d like to think I have a little bit of knowledge, too. So, being able to play off of each other, certainly love each other, respect the
heck out of each other … ”
Family first
Concordia-St. Paul head coach Shannon Currier is in his second stint as coach of the Golden Bears, having left for Truman State after earning NSIC Coach of the Years honors in 2003.
Making the move to Missouri with him was Kuchinski, who had joined the Golden Bears’ staff a year earlier coaching the defensive line after playing at Bemidji State.
The move was a good one for Kuchinski’s burgeoning coaching career, but the success did not come without a price.
“We were talking about family a lot,” Kuchinski said of the Truman State program, “but the hours we were keeping didn’t support that. There were 6:30 a.m. meetings, and sometimes it was nine or ten o’clock at night when you got out of there.”
Kuchinski and his wife, Alicia, a Chanhassen native, were ready to start a family, and the work/family life dynamic was causing them both some unease. Additionally, the couple’s ideal
scenario included a return to the Twin Cities to raise their kids around family.
In the midst of another long work day during the winter of 2008, Kuchinski received an email from his father alerting him to the coaching opening at St. Thomas. While he knew that accepting the job would, in a sense, be a step backward, since it involved moving from Division II to Division III, Kuchinski’s priorities led him to emailing Caruso with his interest.
“He called me an hour later,’ Kuchinski said. “We had a fantastic conversation about nothing to do with football. It was all about life and family — right up my alley.”
The on-campus interview proved just as encouraging for both parties. Alicia Kuchinski had accompanied her husband on the trip to the Twin Cities, and after the interview, the Kuchinskis joined Caruso and his wife, Rachael, for dinner that night.
Both men laugh at the memory of going to a high-end steak house only to leave before ordering when they realized their styles leaned much more casual. A good time was had by all at a nearby Buffalo Wild Wings.
Caruso offered Kuchinski the job before he left campus the next day. An hour into the drive back to Missouri, Kuchinski called Caruso to accept.
Both men had found what they were looking for. Caruso had in Kuchinski a coach devoted to teaching but also to continuing to strive at getting better at his profession. In Caruso, Kuchinski had found a coach who has provided “living proof that there’s another way to do it.”
As fate would have it, Truman State had shifted from a 4-3 defense to a 3-4 defense the year before. “Had they not done that,” Caruso said, “I’m not sure I would have called him.”
‘A better husband and father’
“When a coach has a player who grows into the man he knows he can become, he becomes one of your favorite players,” Caruso said. “Wallie is the coaching version of that.”
The credit for helping him find his way, Kuchinski said, goes to Caruso, whom he praises for being a great listener, and for being someone who offers advice only when asked. “And I’ve needed a lot of advice,” Kuchinski said.
Kuchinski, his wife and their two sons, Colton and Claymore, have all shared in the benefits. “I’m a better husband and father for having worked for Glenn,” Kuchinski said.
The transformation into becoming the man he wanted to be gained a foothold 10 years ago, Kuchinski said. Prior to that, as much as he yearned for a better balance between his
professional and family life, Kuchinski admits to having struggled with taking ownership of his responsibilities for making it a reality.
“I think back to how selfish I was when I would come home and it was like a what’s-for-dinner type of thing,” he said. “All (Alicia) wanted was for me to recognize how much she did.
“There are a lot of divorces in college coaching, and a lot of coaches out there who are really selfish. There’s still times when I go home and I’m there, but my mind is somewhere else. When you’re not there mentally and emotionally, she knows it.”
So the challenge remains, as does the desire to try to keep moving forward.
“We’ve grown so much as men, as fathers and husbands, as coaches,” Caruso said. “And we’ve done it together. When you have that many shared experiences, you have a bond that is tough to put into words. He knows very deeply and very sincerely that I love him.
“We’ve been able to weave our passion for football and our passion for our families together. For us to have those conversations about being a husband, being a father, that’s just who we are.’’
Just as it was the first time the two men talked, it’s all been right up Kuchinski’s alley.
“I don’t think it’s by accident that when my marriage took off, my career as a coach took off, too,” he said.
‘He’s a mastermind’
When it comes to X’s and O’s, Caruso marvels at what he sees as Kuchinski’s rare ability to dictate what opposing offenses do.
“Usually offenses manipulate defenses,” Caruso said. “To see the level he has taken it to — he’s a mastermind, in my opinion.
“The ability to be very good at what you do and still stay curious is a level of mental toughness that very few people have. The ability that he has, partnered with the humility that he displays, is what makes him stand out.”
Kuchinski’s body of work more than suggests that he has earned the chance to run his own program. While acknowledging that various schools have reached out over the years, he has yet to identify a situation that would be a better fit for him and his family than the one he has at St. Thomas.
“There are a lot of reasons why I’m here,” Kuchinski said. “Certainly Glenn, the institution, being able to be close to family. I’ve certainly thought about (being a head coach), but it’s not
something I’m interested in right now.
“Everybody has certain balls that they juggle, and Glenn, being so good at running a program, that’s a high bar to try to attain. I’m cool with basically being the head coach of the defense. I don’t necessarily want to juggle all those balls now. There’s a lot of football that he doesn’t get the chance to do anymore. He doesn’t get to be in meetings with the boys as much as he’d like to.
“Sometimes at this level it is more like being a manager than it is being a coach. I like the coaching part of it.”
Caruso said he is “blessed and grateful” that Kuchinski has remained on the staff all these years. He is sure Kuchinski would be — and one day might very well be — a successful head coach.
“Wallie could do a lot of things,” he said.
But Caruso is not surprised Kuchinski remains at his side.
“Much like Rachael and I, I think he and Alicia have found a place where they can do their life’s work, and they can do it the way they want to do it,” Caruso said. “When smart people find those qualities in a place, it’s not as difficult to stick around as other people might think.”
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