With multiple seasons in one school year, Hengel has coached a combined 94 athletic seasons as a Pioneer
The photo of a man born in South Dakota now hangs in the Gloucester County Sports Hall of Fame.
Tom Hengel was inducted in March during the early days of his 37th year coaching at Clearview Regional High School. Hengel has coached baseball, basketball, cross country and track. He is currently the head girls track coach and has no plans of leaving his post anytime soon.
As there are multiple track seasons in one school year, in total Hengel has served as a Pioneer coach for 94 athletic seasons beginning in 1981, the same year the hall of fame was created.
“The probability of me coaching here was probably stretched to the limits,” Hengel said.
When Hengel was 2, his father took a job with Boeing which moved the family to multiple locations until 1965 when the Hengels planted roots in New Jersey.
While the Clearview coach has lived in Mullica Hill for the majority of his life, graduating from the school in 1972 and attending Glassboro State College (now Rowan), his family first lived in South Harrison Township.
“If we had stayed in South Harrison, I actually would have been a Kingsway Dragon, but instead, moving to Mullica Hill allowed me to become a Pioneer, which probably suits someone from the plains of South Dakota a little bit better,” he said.
Not too long after graduating college, Hengel took a job at Clearview Regional Middle School where he taught physical education and health for 33 years. After retiring from teaching in 2014, Hengel decided to continue in the district as a coach.
“My intention [to coach] was never to do it for this long or to get into a hall of fame. I figured I’d see how it goes and see if I could help some kids out,” he said.
Then seasons passed and runners and cross country teams racked up impressive times, conference championships and even multiple state championships. In his time as a Pioneer coach, Hengel has seen first points, personal records beat and beaten again, and athletes succeed and move into the college ranks.
“We won state championships [girls track] early in my career three years in a row: 1990, ’91 and ‘92,” he said.
After the third championship, he thought to himself that maybe he had a future in coaching college track. However, he didn’t think about it long and said it became solely about helping the kids whether during a good season or not so good.
“You can’t just coach when times are good, you have to coach every individual the same way … you’re trying to help them get better,” he said.
With a tenure as long as his, Hengel said the best word to describe why he continues to coach is “addiction.”
His addiction to help the youth in the Clearview Regional School District has benefitted kids in the world of athletics and also academia.
“You try to help kids learn different things. Not just skills, either. You are trying to get them to understand commitment, persistence and doing your part on a team,” he said.
Showing his years as a Pioneer, Hengel mentioned the cyclical nature of high school athletics, recalling stretches of success and times of rebuilding.
“Not every day is perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but we’ve had good kids here and they work hard,” he said of Clearview students present and past.
The list of team and coaching awards Hengel has received is long, and some date back to before his current athletes were born.
