TONTOGANY — Otsego football coach Matt Dzierwa will never forget the players who changed the program’s culture over the last half decade or more.

Last fall, the 11-1 Knights repeated as Northern Buckeye Conference champions, defeating rival Eastwood twice, in the regular season and playoffs, until falling to eventual state semifinalist Ottawa-Glandorf (11-3), 24-22, in a Division V regional semifinal.

“I would say the last two years, to see these kids growing up since they were little and culminating into the success that they had was amazing,” Dzierwa said.

“It’s not just that, but the kids before that kind of changed the culture a little bit, that was neat to see,” Dzierwa continued. “We went 7-3 one year, and that was the year we saw the kids change things a little bit. Just to see the growth of the kids the last five, six years, it has been neat to see.”

Although he has not ruled out a return to coaching someday, Dzierwa says he will take a break from coaching, at the least, after 29 years.

Dzierwa was hired as Otsego’s football coach for the 2013 season. He is a 1988 graduate of St. John’s Jesuit where he played for legendary coach Fred Beier.

Playing in the Big Ten

Upon graduation from high school, Dzierwa played football for Northwestern University from 1988-92. That is where he got indoctrinated to the fine details of the game.

“I got recruited to be a quarterback and a punter, and the first day of practice my freshman year I got moved to free safety,” Dzierwa said.

“I got introduced to college football pretty quick that way, which was good. I got bounced around position-wise, but I punted for five years, got red-shirted one year, and I got my master’s (degree) in advertising and marketing.

“It was a great experience. I played in some great stadiums and got to see some great football players,” Dzierwa continued.

“It was fantastic. I would not trade that for anything. We were better toward the end of my career, but it was the greatest learning experience I’ve ever had.”

However, Dzierwa believes a coach should not treat high school football players the same way he would treat a college player.

“It’s a different perspective of things and how things should be run. It’s a serious and different world, but here’s the thing — that world is not the high school world,” Dzierwa said.

“High school kids are different, and it should not be a job for them. It should be fun, not that college can’t be. It gives perspective on how college is,” Dzierwa continued.

“In high school, we take it seriously, but we enjoy what we do and the coaching staff the last eight, nine years, we had a little fun, we cared about the kids, and I think that helps a lot.”

Still, Dzierwa said he brought a lot from the college game to his years coaching at St. John’s and Otsego.

“Having the college experience does help, but there is more to coaching than being a former player. It is about relating to kids and trying to get kids to be their best,” Dzierwa said.

“It does help from a practice standpoint, game standpoint, but there is nothing like being in the classroom with the kids and being on the field. That’s how you grow, and you make kids get better, and that’s how you make kids believe.”

Bringing success to Otsego

After college, Dzierwa returned to St. John’s where he was an assistant from 1994-98. In 1998, he was named head coach of St. John’s, where the Titans had a record of 25-19 over four years.

“My time at St. John’s was wonderful,” Dzierwa said. “I was pretty green, to say the least, at St. John’s.

“I went from being a freshman football coach to being a varsity coach, which was a huge step. I had a lot of lessons learned there that carried over to Otsego.”

After moving to Otsego, Dzierwa was an assistant coach from 2002-12. He has been the head coach for the past nine seasons with a record of 58-37.

The Knights’ record, in the last six years, has been 50-15. In 2020, Otsego finished 10-1 and advanced to the state final four for the first time since 1981. Also, the Knights also won their first league title since 2005.

In 2021, Otsego won the conference again and Dzierwa was named 2020 Division V Coach of the Year.

Dzierwa said that coaching football nowadays has become a year-round task.

“It’s 10 to 12 months out of the year — that’s just the way it is. I think we tried to manage it the best that we could,” Dzierwa said.

“We had so many kids who play other sports. It’s a grind sometimes, especially during the football season.

“I was blessed to have most of my coaches in the building, and I had a lot of good ones. Being around these kids all the time I think that really does help.”

Dzierwa said the rewards from coaching make the time worthwhile.

“I think you’d ask most coaches and hopefully they’d tell you they do it for the growth of the kids. You want to see kids grow and mature and I think football teaches a lot of lessons in life,” Dzierwa said.

“There are so many lessons. It is a team game and life is a team game. You talk about perseverance, hard work, how to act when you lose something, and things do not go right.”

Picking out who is top players from nearly three decades is impossible without forgetting someone, he said.

“There have been so many it is hard to pick one. I was fortunate to have a really good ones at St. John’s. One went to the NFL,” Dzierwa said.

“But here’s the thing that gets back to the team game — there were so many kids who were not the superstars or got their names in the paper that did just a nice job of working hard.

“A lot of those linemen never got any credit, but (Otsego’s 2021 NBC Lineman of the Year) Cade Limes is probably one of the best all-around football players who made a difference in the game, that I’ve ever been around.

“He was the exception, but there were so many other kids who worked hard in practice and became better people for it. But that is the joy of coaching, too.”

Matt and his wife, Dasa, have three children. Madison is a junior at Loyola University-Chicago. Noah is a freshman at Ohio State, where he plays on the club baseball team.

Joseph, who was a 6-foot-6 record-setting quarterback at Otsego, has played football for the past four years. A senior, he has committed to playing baseball for Michigan State University.