TUPATALK: A salute to area softball coaching tradition

One of greatest sports assets of our area has been the quality of softball head coaches that have molded, inspired and guided their players to soaring accomplishments on the field and helped prepare them for successful lives after graduation.

Two of the top have been Barnsdall High’s Joe Gilbert and Copan High’s Randy Davis.

There might be some new residents in the area that don’t know who Joe was. As a fresh graduate of Northeastern State University (Tahlequah) he arrived in Barnsdall in 1954 to apply for a coaching and teaching opening. I’m not even sure how he made the 105 mile trip from Tahlequah.

Barnsdall hired the dedicated 21-year-old dynamo — perhaps the school’s best personnel decision ever made. The town certainly got its money worth — Gilbert coached at the school for the following 66 years, until his passing, in his latter 80s, in 2020.

He also served as an educator for most of that time and took on the athletic director duties for many years.

Joe is enshrined in many Hall of Fames, including on a national level.

Randy hailed from Sedan, Kan. The son of a Hall of Fame coach, Davis and his brothers chose to follow in his path as educators and coaches. Randy coach softball at Copan, which won seven state championships in a 12-year period, starting in 1988.

During my first year of school sports coverage in the area, I reported on Gilbert’s Barnsdall Lady Panthers taking on Davis’ Copan Lady Hornets in a regional softball tournament, with a state tournament spot on the line.

I don’t know I’ve ever seen two more fiercely competitive — who banked their internal fires with sportsmanship, discipline, gentlemaness and class — and incredible coaches go head-to-head like that.

Each coach, I think, looked forward to the games against each other as must-win dates.

But, in the furnace of competition they forged a mountain of friendship and respect for each other. Randy recently told me how much he missed Joe’s presence.

Another area prep softball coach I enjoyed following for many years was Caney Valley’s Randy Gardner. During the 1990s and early 20002, Caney Valley, Barnsdall and Copan waged some classic battles, often decided by a single hit.

In 2009, Randy navigated the Lady Trojans to a state title after his program had been so close to that level multiple times in the previous 14 seasons.

Of course, I’ve rubbed shoulders with other tremendous softball coaches. But, these three stand out because of the number of years I’ve covered them — 24 seasons with Gilbert, about that long with Gardner, and about 20 years total with Davis.

I didn’t want to leave out Thad Hewitt of Oklahoma Union and now Nowata. Although he was another long-time coach, I didn’t cover Oklahoma Union as closely until the past five years, or so. But, he’s another extraordinary talent as a skipper.

There’s another group of special diamond coaches I treasure the opportunity to have covered — the guys who worked with area summer competitive teams. The trio of Ron Swigart, Benny McClintock and Larry McCoy served as the main nucleus of the Chevy City Blazers 18U team, assisted by other guys such as Don Brisbin, Kim Shepherd, Tom Bucher and others.

I really can’t summarize how the Blazer program, which included five-or-more younger teams, filled summer nights in Bartlesville with excitement, color and drama at the Blazer fields.

Swigart oversaw the effort and served as the Blazers’ head coach. The Blazers established themselves as one of the elite program in this section of the nation and many times for the entire nation.

Something significant to note is when the Blazers, and a couple of other summer programs in Bartlesville thrived, the local high schools (Sooner/College/Bartlesville) recorded three state titles within five years, and played in the state championship game in other seasons. After the Blazer program slowly lost support and faded in the latter part of the decade of the 2000s, Bartlesville hasn’t been back to the state final.

Glenn Chinn of the Bowring Wrangles’ summer softball team was another talented and focused coach that helped elevate the success of the Copan and Dewey high softball teams. Glenn could come across at times a bit gruff — but I think he had a giant heart, particularly when it came to softball and his players. He passed away way too soon.

Ronda Houser started up the Aces as a third option in area summer softball competition and also built a quality program.

We currently enjoy an outstanding group of area prep softball coaches, a large percentage of them individuals that attended area high schools.

This article originally appeared on Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise: TUPATALK: A salute to area softball coaching tradition