Coach Ekeler is here to PUMP YOU UP!

[hack]

Published Sunday, July 13, 2008

NU Football: Ekeler's energy non-stop

BY JON NYATAWA

WORLD-HERALD BUREAU

 

LINCOLN — Mike Ekeler, then a player at Kansas State, wanted to shave his eyebrows to match his bald head, a game-day look that would surely top his hairdos of the previous three weeks.

 

Click to Enlarge

 

"I had the self-appointed NCAA record for having the most fun as a player," NU linebackers coach Mike Ekeler said. "I will challenge anybody that says they had more fun than I did."

He had gone from bowl cut to purple mohawk to complete baldness — and he vowed to teammates, coaches and local reporters that he'd take it up a notch for his team's next game against Oklahoma.

 

But a Kansas State team trainer vetoed the idea, warning Ekeler of the dangers an eyebrow-less football player faced.

 

Drops of sweat in eyes, of course.

 

So Ekeler settled for an unintentionally offset and nonsymmetrical "X" across the back of his head, courtesy of an untested barber — teammate Kirby Hocutt.

 

That hairdo was modified each week. Ekeler allowed one of the four sections to grow back each time his team earned a win in the final half of its conference season.

 

It was absolutely hideous, he said.

 

Click to Enlarge

 

Mike and Barbie Ekeler and their children, from left, Cameryn, 6; J.J., 7; Bella, 9 months; and Abigail, 4.

"If my wife would have seen me at that point in time, she would not be here right now," Ekeler said. "I didn't have many dates. I'm not going to lie."

 

Mike Ekeler, 36, now has a more conventional haircut, the "perfect" wife, four children and the best job he's ever had — a full-time linebackers coach at Nebraska. Hocutt became the athletic director of the Miami Hurricanes in June.

 

The two former K-State road trip roommates still talk at least once every two weeks.

 

"I don't think he's capable of changing," said Hocutt, a senior captain on the '94 Wildcat team. "He is who he's always been."

 

He'll hop aboard an elephant at the Shrine Circus, which he did this spring, volunteering to fill in for coach Bo Pelini. "It was awe-

some," Ekeler said.

 

Barbie Ekeler, his wife of nine years, just laughs when she hears of her husband's eagerness to appear in the circus or of his spontaneous hairstyling methods as a K-State player.

 

Mike's less of a "nut" now, she said. But if an NU coach or player sincerely dares him, "he'll have a mohawk in a heartbeat."

 

It's only a matter of time, she assumes, that the stuffed remains of Mike's one-time pet piranha are removed from their attic.

 

At KSU, Mike Ekeler carried the razor-toothed fish — named Carl Spackler, after Bill Murray's character in "Caddyshack" — around the K-State football complex, mounted it above his locker and paid homage to it before games.

 

Occasionally, Ekeler added to the locker room entertainment by reciting direct quotes from "Caddyshack."

 

"Cinderella story. Outta nowhere. A former greenskeeper, now, about to become the Masters champion. It looks like a mirac . . . It's in the hole! It's in the hole! It's in the hole!"

 

Ekeler knows the entire movie, Hocutt said. He showcased that particular talent last winter during a recruiting trip to Will Compton's house. The Spacklerisms from the 1980 movie likely went over young Will's head, but parents Bill and Kathy nearly hit the floor laughing.

 

Hocutt said Ekeler did a similar routine when he unexpectedly wound up with the mic at a Kansas State fan appreciation day.

 

"So I jump ship in Hong Kong and make my way over to Tibet, and I get on as a looper at a course over in the Himalayas. A looper, you know, a caddy, a looper, a jock. So, I tell them I'm a pro jock, and who do you think they give me? The Dalai Lama, himself . . ."

 

The quote goes on for another 123 words, and Ekeler can rattle off the whole 181-word mouthful at anytime. Just ask him.

 

At KSU fan day he wrapped it up with: "We got the best fans in the world, I love you, peace!"

 

At which point coach Bill Snyder banned Ekeler from ever talking to the news media.

 

"We didn't know what'd happen when he got a microphone again," Hocutt said.

 

But Ekeler always got back on Snyder's good side the moment he stepped on the football field.

 

He was a walk-on linebacker and the only Snyder-appointed team captain in the legendary coach's 17-year tenure at Kansas State. Ekeler earned the team's courage award as a junior and its leadership award as a senior.

 

One day at practice, he grabbed everyone's attention when he got bored with his task of eliminating three or four would-be blockers during kickoff drills. So he promised a few teammates that he'd leap over them next time and make the tackle.

 

He did it, somehow, Hocutt said. "Amazing."

 

Ekeler credits one of his high school coaches for molding his in-game personality, in all sports.

 

Tim Brown, Ekeler's baseball and basketball coach at Blair High School, once refereed a football game in Omaha and couldn't stop talking about a linebacker who made "every single play," Ekeler remembers. So from then on, Ekeler said, he played with the goal of making fans leave the stadium with thoughts like Brown's.

 

"I was an average-as-grits athlete, and I knew I had to make up for it some way," he said. "And that was, I better play harder than anybody out there and have more fun than anybody. That's kind of what happened."

 

Ekeler's always been a competitor, Brown said, ever since he started hanging out with Brown's son, Lance, in elementary school.

 

By Ekeler's high school years, he developed into a basketball player's worst nightmare, always bumping, diving, reaching and pestering.

 

"Whatever he lacked in talent and grace and ability he more than made up for it in determination and effort," Brown said. "He didn't score a whole bunch of points, but you certainly didn't want him playing man-to-man against you."

 

Ekeler would like to see his players at Nebraska adopt that same type of personality on the football field, which is why he approaches every practice, meeting or recruiting visit with the same contagious energy and excitement.

 

Ask recruit Cody Green what led him to suddenly consider Nebraska as his college choice, right there with the original frontrunner (Texas A&M) that's just two hours away from his family. Green, who verbally committed to the Huskers Wednesday, will respond with his own question: "Have you ever met Coach Ekeler? . . . He's wild. Just talking to him, he got me all fired up."

 

Ekeler's linebackers know the feeling.

 

In practices, Ekeler expresses his support with screams so loud they easily could have awoken a passed out, couch-hogging college roommate after an alcohol-filled Saturday night.

 

"He's the loudest I've ever heard," senior linebacker Cody Glenn said.

 

More of Ekeler's yelling — and usually some shoves, high-fives and chest bumps — comes after players make an instinctively quick read or deliver a pain-inducing hit.

 

Ekeler doesn't calm down until he sees a mistake, which he'll address with a concerned, but supportive tone.

 

"He'll make sure you know what you did and how you can go about fixing it," Glenn said. "He's not there yelling in your ear after you mess up."

 

Even in his early days as a coach, Ekeler had the ability to make players better, according to Mike Zeplin, former coach at Omaha Skutt High School.

 

Ekeler's first coaching job was a volunteer position that lasted three years under Zeplin. Ekeler spent the first working with just the freshmen. The final two seasons, he coordinated the varsity team's defense.

 

"To me, he optimized what a good coach was," Zeplin said. "He did whatever it took to reach kids. He held them accountable. . . . He was a great teacher."

 

Ekeler moved on, planning to manage his private sales business representing a metal stamping company while he and his wife raised their family in Manhattan, Kan. He assumed his free time could be spent as a coach at the high school.

 

Mike and Barbie even spent a year building their six-bedroom dream house with specific amenities — like a projector television screen downstairs.

 

But they stayed there for only seven months.

 

Mike Ekeler sold the home, bought a new one by phone from then-Oklahoma assistant Mike Stoops and moved to Norman, Okla., in 2003 so he could become a graduate assistant.

 

Ekeler latched on to Bo Pelini in 2004 at Oklahoma, following the defensive coordinator to LSU and serving as a graduate assistant and a football intern.

 

And now Ekeler has his first real, full-time collegiate gig. A wild way to accomplish a goal, Ekeler admits, but not one that he would change.

 

"If I had gotten into it right (after college), I wouldn't have a family. I wouldn't be married," he said. "I'm not saying I'm a complete person, but I wouldn't have had that aspect. I'm so thankful that I kind of went a roundabout way of doing it."

 

Ekeler arrived in Lincoln on Jan. 8, but didn't take his first official day off until June 18. Crammed into that time frame were things like practices, recruiting trips (Ekeler went on a 100-plus high school tour in Texas), personnel meetings, phone conversations and charity/fundraising events. And then there were more recruiting trips and more meetings.

 

But Ekeler swears he's having lots of fun, just like his days at Kansas State.

 

"I had the self-appointed NCAA record for having the most fun as a player," he said. "I will challenge anybody that says they had more fun than I did."

 

And he's going for the same goal as coach.

 

"I just enjoy it," he said. "I enjoy being around the players and having an impact on those guys."

 

[zoogs]

"To me, he optimized what a good coach was," Zeplin said. "He did whatever it took to reach kids. He held them accountable. . . . He was a great teacher."

 

Ekeler's amazing. He doesn't just epitomize, he optimizes. The real deal, folks.

[hack]

Ekeler's amazing. He doesn't just epitomize, he optimizes. The real deal, folks.

 

we'll see about that later this season, but from everything i've heard so far it sounds like he's a heck of a guy and could very well be college football's next *big* assistant that everyone whispers about when a coaching job comes open.

 

or not. who knows?

[huskernumerouno]

Between Bo and Ekeler we should never see a team lacking fire

[bbhusker]

It's awsome that this guy wasn't the most talented athlete but made up for it with effort and determination. If he can get his linebackers to buy in and play the same way, we should see some great effort from our linebackers this year and the years to come. By the mid to late season the execution will come with the effort. Very exciting!

[Hunter94]

the guy sounds like a huge plus......good to have him on board.

[RedDenver]

I think one of the best accolades for Ekeler was that Bill Snyder hand-picked him to be a team captain - and that's the only time Snyder ever did that. Let's not forget, Brown, Sanders, Cotton, and Carl are also excellent motivators to go along with Bo and Ekeler.

[Husker_x]

I think one of the best accolades for Ekeler was that Bill Snyder hand-picked him to be a team captain - and that's the only time Snyder ever did that. Let's not forget, Brown, Sanders, Cotton, and Carl are also excellent motivators to go along with Bo and Ekeler.

 

Bo always said he surrounded himself with like-minded people. This is what you get. And with the best coach ever to call a game of college football as our sitting Athletic Director, everything is in position for a breakout. It's people like Ekeler, Brown, Pelini, Sanders, and Cotton that get kids to play beyond what they thought they could. Bo once said "Defense starts with effort." I think he's right––the whole game starts with effort.

 

I'm not concerned about the team falling apart this season. I'm excited to see how far Pelini and staff can push this this group.

[Drowning_in_the_Sea_of_Red]

I'd like to take this time to coin the term: "Ekeler-ection".

 

I think it compliments the "Bo-gasm" nicely.

[Danimal]

I'll admit I was one of the folks that were hesitant about being the first fulltime coaching-job for Ekeler and Papuchis. But they really seem to be the real deal. Ek is a beast. He may turn into another John Blake on the recruiting-circuit.

[Vuren]

I'll admit I was one of the folks that were hesitant about being the first fulltime coaching-job for Ekeler and Papuchis. But they really seem to be the real deal. Ek is a beast. He may turn into another John Blake on the recruiting-circuit.

lets hope he's better at building players then blake though.

[huskernumerouno]

I'd like to take this time to coin the term: "Ekeler-ection".

 

I think it compliments the "Bo-gasm" nicely.

Welcome back

[RedDenver]

I'd like to take this time to coin the term: "Ekeler-ection".

 

I think it compliments the "Bo-gasm" nicely.

I'd drop the 'r' - as in Ekel-ection.

[DeathCultArmaggedon]

Wow, he's f*&cking nuts! I love it.

[Vuren]

Wow, he's f*&cking nuts! I love it.

he's nuts in the good way