From player to coach, to athletic director, Grabow did it all

By Kevin Wilson of the Daily Times staff
Friday, March 7, 2008 10:25 PM CST

For several decades, Harris Grabow's name was synonymous with Watertown sports. As a player, coach and athletic director, his record of success has left a lasting impression on teammates and players throughout the area.

Harris Grabow didn't make the cut when trying out for Watertown High School's freshman boys basketball team back in 1935.

That didn't dampen his enthusiasm for the sport one bit.

“I'd stand in line before the doors open,” Grabow said. “The second game (during my sophomore year), the manager came out and said, ‘Is Harris Grabow here?' I said, ‘Yes sir, I'm here.' He said, ‘Coach wants you to start.'

“Really?”

Grabow's call-up from the ticket line to the varsity began a unique basketball odyssey which saw him play for a state championship team in 1939 and then coach his alma mater to a rare trip to the state tournament 21 years later.

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Early on, Watertown was actually a fixture on the state scene since the inception of the tournament back in 1916. The Goslings had made seven trips to state prior to Grabow's era, including a state title won in 1928.

But the last appearance prior to Grabow's senior year was 1931.

The Goslings finished 15-5 his sophomore season and 11-9 the next year.

After that, legendary football and basketball coach Arnold Landsverk made pivotal changes.

“I started out as a forward,” Grabow said. “Then later when I made varsity I reversed to the center when they used the press. Senior year, the coach used the press. We were one of the first in the state to use it. We guarded everybody all over the court, man for man, usually. We lost the first game with three days of practice, then won the next 22 games and won the championship.”

Grabow led the Goslings in scoring 13 times during his senior season, capped by an 11-point performance in Watertown's 33-28 win over Neenah in the Class B title game. He was named to the first team all-state team.

He remembered the challenge of playing at University of Wisconsin Field House in Madison vividly.

“The old Field House certainly wasn't as good as the Kohl Center is today,” Grabow said. “It was big, and the strange thing in shooting was you had no close walls or ceiling to guide your ball. You had to get used to the distance of free throw line and the circle. It's difficult for everybody. You play in a small gym and then go to a big gym Š it's a matter of calculating the distance to the basket and shooting.”

The Gos-lings opened the tournament with a 35-33 quarterfinal win over Stoughton.

Watertown's long range specialist, Bob Stupka, dropped in a deep perimeter shot in the final minute to help the Goslings break a 33-33 tie and beat their league rival for the third time that season.

After putting on a defensive clinic in a 25-13 semifinal win over Tomah, Watertown faced Neenah in the title game and led after every quarter.

Grabow remembered the community's support fondly.

“We had an awful lot of people there,” Grabow said. “In those days, we had a big assembly program.”

Playing basketball didn't just lead Grabow to glory. It also led him to matrimony.

“I guarded my (future) brother-in-law, Baldwin,” Grabow said. “I was a sophomore and he was a senior and it was my job to guard him in practice. He introduced me to my wife. He said, ‘Come on over, Helen makes good cake.' We were married 62 years.”

Upon graduation, Grabow went to Beloit College for one semester, but transferred to La Crosse State when he found out Beloit didn't offer any coaching classes.

At La Crosse, he lettered in football, basketball and track. He played quarterback for the 1942 conference champion football team and served as captain of the 1942-43 basketball team.

During his senior year, Grabow went into the service and didn't finish the whole season “because people were leaving all the time.”

He served in the medical force as a physical training instructor and convalescent training instructor, helping people who had been injured in airplane accidents. Grabow played in the service on the Army/Air Force football team at Truax Field in Madison.

“We played Wisconsin, Marquette, the University of Mexico,” Grabow said. “We once came down to play Northwestern when Len Umnus was the coach. He wanted me to come play in front of his team and the people of Watertown. It was quite an honor for me. He and Arnold Landsverk were my role models. They were why I wanted to become a coach.”

Grabow would have loved nothing more than to coach and be a physical education teacher for a living, but at the time he attended La Crosse, graduates were only placing 37 percent in physical education while placing higher in other academic fields.

“So I took sciences with a phy ed minor,” Grabow said.

From there, Grabow first went to the North Foundation School as a teacher and coach, then came to Watertown in 1946 when a science instructor position opened up.

“Mark Anderson went to Illinois, and they needed a science instructor,” Grabow said. “Basketball wasn't going as good as the board members would have liked. The principal and coach brought me back to Watertown. It was my job to build up the program.”

From 1946-54, Grabow's Watertown teams weren't in a conference, so they traveled wherever they could find games.

“We were freelancing,” Grabow said. “We played anybody that would play us. That was tough, up to Eau Claire, over to La Crosse, Edgewood Š anybody who would play us. We played good schools.”

That was particularly true in the postseason.

The Goslings reached the sectionals five times under Grabow. The first came in 1951. Led by Marquette recruit Rube Schulz, Watertown reached the sectional final against Madison East. But Schulz fell ill in the days leading up to the game and played limited minutes in the team's 74-60 loss.

“Rube was our key player,” Grabow said. “He got ill the last game. We got beat by Madison East. The doctor said, ‘You can only play him three minutes at a time.' That really upset our program. We had to take him out and rest him. That was a difficult game to play.

“We had a contingency from Water-town to Waupun, people who watched it that night. We thought we'd go to state that year. We played in a holiday tournament (in Madison). That was nice. We hoped we'd (play there again at state). We'd get to the finals of sectionals, but we just couldn't make it. We had Beloit, Sheboygan, Madison and Milwaukee schools to go through. That was really, really tough. It still is.”

But in 1960, Grabow's Goslings finally did break through.

Dick Schumann, Dave Engelbrecht, Bill Mullen, Jim Cahoon and Dick Rohde spearheaded a memorable season, culminating with a trip to state after a 64-57 win over Sheboygan Central in the sectional championship played at Beaver Dam.

“Bill Mullen's group, that was,” Grabow said. “They had Dick Schumann, (whose family) was noted at the time for sports. His grandpa, Clarence (Bumps) played on 1933 football team, that was unscored upon that year. To me, that was exceptional.”

Engelbrecht scored 21 points in the sectional final while Schumann added 18 and Cahoon 13.

“(Sheboygan) was coached by Carl Huebner from Watertown,” Grabow said. “It was the only time I ever coached against him. It was a good, tight, close game. I remember the happiness of the players, to think that they were going to state.”

The Goslings lost their first round game at state to Menomonee, 66-49. In a consolation bracket game, Watertown lost to Racine Park 60-55 and was eliminated.

“It was traumatic,” Grabow said. “We played Racine Park and my assistant coach, Jim Thompson, became the football coach at Racine and that was really hard. It was a stinging defeat for me. Jim had coached those kids as an assistant varsity coach. He had what we called the freshman and sophomore team. Then he went to Racine and it was really tough to lose to that team because he knew very well that we had a left-hander in Engelbrecht.”

Even though his team didn't fare well as he would have liked at the state tournament, getting there was one of the crowning achievements of coaching career.

“It's a wonderful feeling,” Grabow said. “I really can't explain how much it does for a coach.”

Grabow also served as head baseball coach from 1948-54 and assistant football coach until 1995. In the summer, he coached the American Legion baseball team.

He coached Watertown's High School baseball team to the state semifinals in 1951, when the Goslings lost to West Bend.

But his passion was always for basketball.

“I love basketball,” Grabow said. “I spent weekends, all my time, thinking about basketball, I think. We used the fast break in those days and that's why we had one team that averaged 80 points for the season.

“I read a 50 years ago (segment) in the paper recently, and it said we'd been over 100 points in several games.”

Grabow coached basketball exclusively from 1955-66.

“I stopped coaching in ‘66,” Grabow said. “I coached for 20 years. When my son, Steve, came up, I didn't want to coach. I wanted him to have another. He held the school record for consecutive free throws (52) for a long, long time.”

His overall coaching record with the basketball team was 118-36. In his last 13 seasons, the Goslings played in the Braveland Conference first and then later joined the Little Ten. During that span, Watertown won or shared seven conference titles, finished second three times and finished third three times.

Grabow immediately transitioned into the school's athletic director and held that position until 1983.

He served on the board of directors of the Wisconsin Athletic Directors Association from 1976-83. In 1981, his outstanding work in athletic administration was recognized with his selection as Wisconsin's Athletic Director of the Year. He was also a charter member of the National Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association, and received the group's Distinguished Service Award in 1982.

During his tenure as AD and beyond it, the boys basketball program flourished under his former assistant Eli Crogan.

“Eli was my assistant,” Grabow said. “Then he went to UW-Whitewater. Then they didn't give him seniority, so he came back here. He and I used to talk until midnight. We filled the gyms. They built us a new gym so we could fill it, and we did. We had good crowds. Since then, basketball has been our main ingredient.”

With the advent of Title IX, girls basketball also came on the scene. Watertown was one of the early big school powers in the state, winning the Class A title in 1977 and finishing second in 1981.

“One of my biggest joys in starting girls athletics was to start the girls basketball program,” Grabow said. “Then to have them win the state title Š I was a driver. In those days, we drove cars down. I really enjoyed all the kids. They were as wholesome as could be.”

Grabow enjoyed most aspects of being an athletic director, and handled the challenging aspects as well as could be expected.

“I had a lot of fun,” Grabow said. “I really enjoyed that. I had many girls come in and tell me things they didn't want to, (how they didn't) approve of the way their coach handled them. I would have to get them together and smooth things out. As AD, you have to learn negotiations. You certainly get a lot of experience with parents and children and coaches.

“All the coaches are good friends of mine. I always defended my coaches. I do enjoy seeing them. At the time, they always thought I was a cruel guy, because I had to say no sometimes. But all in all, I thought we had a very good relationship.”

During Grabow's tenure as AD, he was responsible for the athletic programs, throughout the district - not just the high school.

“When I left, we had 56 coaches under me, so that's quite a growth,” Grabow said. “Through the fifth and sixth grade when we had basketball. I took them all. I even booked the officials for those games. I asked high school kids to ref the fifth- and sixth-grade games. It's great that they don't do that any more.”

After he retired from the district, Grabow stopped regularly attending local sporting events, though he sometimes return for special occasions.

“I seldom go anymore, but I did go when they dedicated the football field to Landsverk,” Grabow said. “I felt coach Landsverk was my role model and I'm glad Watertown has kept winning and doing the good work he did when he was here.”

There are those who look up to Grabow the same way.

“He leaned toward being cerebral as compared to being fiery,” Rube Schulz said. “I thought a lot of him. I thought he was the greatest coach there was.”