Set to retire in December, Wagner coached 77 seasons in seven different sports across four different levels.
By MIKE MONOSTRA
The Sun
If you were to name a sports team in the Clearview Regional High School District, there’s a decent chance long-time coach and teacher Scott Wagner has coached it.
For more than 30 years, Wagner has been an integral part of the Clearview community as a coach and teacher. Wagner just finished his 77th season of coaching as he led the Clearview freshman girls soccer team this fall. That 77th season was also his last, as Wagner will retire from teaching on Dec. 21 and will also step away as a coach.
“I think this will probably be it,” Wagner said last Tuesday prior to traveling with Clearview girls’ soccer to their first round playoff game. “It’s time other people do it. I’ll be free to go around and see some of my former players.”
During his tenure at Clearview, Wagner has coached sports at every level from middle school to high school varsity. The list of sports he’s coach is enormous: girls basketball, football, cross country, baseball, softball, girls soccer and boys volleyball.
Wagner’s connection to Clearview goes much deeper than just being a coach. Wagner recalls attending Clearview sporting events more than 50 years ago, long before he ever stepped on the field as a player or coach.
“When I was in kindergarten, in like 1964, neighbors of mine played for Clearview football,” Wagner said. “My parents starting taking me to football and basketball games in 1964 and 1965.”
Wagner would eventually attend Clearview, where he played on the varsity basketball team for three seasons. Wagner also played three years in Clearview’s football program and then played soccer his senior year.
After graduating from Clearview in 1977, Wagner attended Glassboro State University, now named Rowan University. Wagner’s athletic career ended after one year of playing JV soccer for Glassboro State and his focus began to shift toward coaching.
“Sports has played such a big part of my life, it just seemed natural,” Wagner said.
Wagner began working for the school district as a substitute teacher while still in college. After graduating, Wagner was hired first as a special education aide and then became a social studies teacher at Clearview Middle School. Wagner has taught seventh grade social studies for nearly his entire career.
“I’m a history buff. I love history, I love the connection of things,” Wagner said. “I love middle school kids. That sounds strange and people think you’re crazy, but I think teachers find their group.”
While Wagner has spent plenty of time teaching history to countless middle school students, he has also spent time coaching thousands of athletes on everything from the volleyball court to the baseball diamond. Wagner began coaching in 1983, with one of his first jobs being an assistant coach for the football team under long-time head coach Dan Pidcock. In all, Wagner, got to coach with three Gloucester County Sports Hall of Fame coaches: Pidcock, former girls basketball coach Don Bills and former softball coach Marilyn Bennette. Wagner is also in the Hall of Fame, having been inducted in 2014.
“They put me on the path to be a head coach,” Wagner said of Pidcock, Bills and Bennette. “I got to to learn from three people who were in a Hall of Fame before I took over a program.”
“They’re great people and great friends,” Wagner added. “They put up with me as a young person on their staff and taught me how to do things the right way.”
Some of the sports Wagner coached, such as football and basketball, were ones he had played previously. Others, such as baseball, were sports of which Wagner didn’t have much knowledge. Wagner spent two seasons early in his career coaching the freshman baseball team with long-time Clearview track and field and cross country coach Tom Hengel.
“Tom Hengel and I, neither of us had much of a baseball background,” he added. “We each went out and bought three or four books on how to coach baseball.”
Wagner can’t pick a favorite team or even a favorite sport. He views each of the jobs he’s held as unique and said the people he has interacted with over the years are the reason he’s continued to coach for so long.
Wagner said he coached in all three high school sports seasons, fall, winter and spring, his first 16 or 17 years at Clearview. He has also coached in all three seasons in recent years, most recently serving as the freshman girls soccer coach in the fall, middle school girls basketball coach in the winter and varsity boys volleyball coach in the spring.
“I just enjoy it,” he said. “It’s about being around the kids, the atmosphere, the competitiveness.”
After the freshman girls soccer team’s final game, Wagner received a ball from his players, something he will cherish for a long time.
“That’s what you miss,” he said. “I’ll miss the games. I miss the kids especially, just those relationships you build with them.”
