Last month in this series, we took a look at the student-athletes that made names for themselves throughout the course of the 127 years in which athletics has been part of the landscape at Missouri S&T.  But for those student-athletes to shine, they needed guidance and this article will take a look at the coaches that had a major hand in that success over the years.

The list will begin with the individual whose name adorns the main athletic complex at the university, Gale Bullman.  After coming to S&T from Washington University in 1937 to take over the reins of the football program – as well as the track & field squad – he guided the Miners to 96 wins, five conference championships and a post-season victory in the 1950 Corn Bowl over a span of 37 seasons; the 96 wins were the most by any head coach at the time in the history of the Missouri Intercollegiate Athletic Association.

Bullman also served as the director of athletics during the time he was coach, but his retirement from the football position following the 1963 season also brought two more coaches into prominent positions.  The first of the two was already on the staff, as Dewey Allgood came to the Miner program as the head basketball and assistant football coach on Bullman's staff in 1950 and spent 14 seasons guiding the basketball program.

Following Bullman's retirement, Allgood was elevated to the position of head football coach and spent eight seasons in that role.  Being the head basketball and football coaches was not all that Allgood did for the Miner athletic program, as he also served as the head golf, cross country and track & field coach during a 40-year career on career that also saw him spend time at the administrative level.

As stated in a program from his retirement celebration in 1990, his greatest contribution was his "personal concern and care for the many student-athletes he has coached.  He has truly made a difference in their lives."

In 2000, the S&T football and track & field facility was renamed Allgood-Bailey Stadium in honor of Allgood, the coach for former football student-athlete Keith Bailey who was the lead benefactor in the renovation project for the stadium.

The other coach that moved into a prominent role in the mid-1960s also came to Rolla from a St. Louis-based school, as Billy Key took over as the head basketball coach when Allgood moved to the head coaching role with the football program.  Key – who came to S&T from Harris-Stowe and would later become the university's director of athletics – won 278 games in a 22-season run at the helm, which included the Miners' first MIAA champions and two NCAA Division II Tournament appearances.

Key retired as basketball coach following the 1986-87 season and remained as the director of athletics until the end of the 1990 calendar year.  At the 2008-09 season-opening basketball game, the floor in what is now Gibson Arena (named for John & Kristie Gibson; John was a former player under Key in the 1970s) was named after the longtime coach.

Key's long-time assistant, Dale Martin, took over as head coach in 1987 and won 242 more games over the next 23 seasons, which included an MIAA championship in 1996 and the program's deepest run in the NCAA Division II Tournament as it reached the Sweet 16 in the course of a 25-6 campaign.  Today, Bill Walker, who has ties to the program as a player when Key was the head coach and Martin was the assistant, is looking to change the Miner fortunes as he now sits in the head coaching seat.

When Allgood stepped away from the head football position following the 1971 season, an assistant also took over at that time and led the Miners to another significant run of success.  Charlie Finley became the head coach in 1972 and five seasons later, led S&T to its first MIAA championship since 1956 and first of three conference titles in a span of seven years.  The highlight season in that run came in 1980, when the Miners recorded their second undefeated season in program history by going 10-0 and finishing among the top 10 in the final national rankings.

Finley broke the record for MIAA wins as he finished with 100, but unfortunately, that 1980 team was denied an opportunity to play in the post-season as only eight teams were selected at the time to compete in the national playoffs.  S&T was also left out of the playoffs when it went 10-1 under David Brown in 2012 and again in 2018 under Tyler Fenwick, but the latter squad did get a chance to play a post-season game and made the most of it, as the Miners routed Minnesota State Moorhead 51-16 in the Mineral Water Bowl to close out a 10-2 season.

While Finley was head coach, he had a staff that included Joe Keeton and Bud Mercier, both of whom are part of the Miner Athletic Hall of Fame along with Finley.  Keeton was the offensive line coach during that successful era of the late 1970s and early 1980s and also served as head coach of the wrestling and track & field programs during his tenure at the university, while Mercier headed the golf program and took the team to MIAA and regional championships during the 1969 season, as it went on to a 12^th place finish at the NCAA Division II Championships.

The sport where the Miners have enjoyed their greatest amount of national success has been in swimming and under the direction of three coaches over a span of five decades.  After Burr Van Nostrand had headed the program through most of the 1950s and 1960s, Bob Pease took over in 1969 and took the Miners to their first scoring performance at the NCAA Division II Championships in his second season.

By 1977, the Miners recorded their first top-10 national finish as they finished eighth, then had three more top-10 finishes under Pease before he turned over the reins to Mark Mullin prior to the 1985-86 season.  In Mullin's first season, the Miners matched their top finish in school history by finishing eighth, then had two more top-10 efforts that included the top finish ever at the time in his last year at the helm in 1998, when S&T took third at the national meet.

Mullin, who had become S&T's director of athletics six years earlier, stepped down from the head coaching position to move in the administrative role on a full-time basis and elevated assistant coach Doug Grooms to that spot. 

Under Grooms, the Miners have been a regular near the top of the national standings, with 14 top-10 finishes that included eight straight seasons in the top 10, five finishes among the top five in the nation including a national runner-up finish in 2008 and numerous school record performances as every current swimming record has been established during his tenure.  S&T has also won 14 conference championships during Grooms' run as head coach.

Two other current coaches of men's team have also carved out their niche in Miner athletic history.  Todd DeGraffenreid took over the baseball program prior to the 2004 season and began to build it into a force in the Great Lakes Valley Conference.   Over the last 10 seasons, the Miners have won 259 games, four GLVC divisional or regular season titles and made two appearances in the NCAA Midwest Regional which included a trip to the regional championship game in 2016.  Eight of the last nine GLVC Tournaments have included the Miners in the field.

After Sterling Martin took over as head coach of the track & field program, he also built the Miner team to where it could be found at or near the top of the GLVC standings on an annual basis at both the indoor and outdoor championships.  The Miners won four GLVC titles under Martin, then Shaun Meinecke took the baton and continued that run of success, guiding S&T to championships at the GLVC's outdoor meet in 2018 and indoor meet in 2020.

Paul McNally started the men's soccer program in 1979 and led the Miners to 78 wins over nine seasons at the helm, a mark no other coach of the program has been able to reach.  However, Dawson Driscoll coached the Miners to a pair of MIAA championships in his five years in the position and Joe Ahearn led S&T to a GLVC regular season title and a trip to the NCAA Division II Midwest Regional championship game in 2010 in the midst of his six years as head coach.

McNally was also the first head coach of the women's soccer program, which began in 1982 and he served twice as head coach.  After leading the program in its first three seasons of existence, he returned to the head coaching post in 1987 for one season.  The Miners made their biggest leap, however, a decade later as it posted the best season in school history – going 15-3-1 -- in the 1997 campaign under the direction of Mark Salisbury.  S&T's current head coach, Joe McCauley, has posted the most wins of any coach in program history and led the Miners to the championship game of the 2014 GLVC Tournament.

When one thinks of women's sports at Missouri S&T, one name that tends to come up is that of Sarah Moore.  During a long career on the coaching staff, Moore was the first head coach for the softball, tennis, cross country and track & field programs; she also spent time as the men's track and cross country coach as well.   But it was Annette Caruso who was the first women's coach at the university, as she started up the basketball and volleyball programs upon her arrival in Rolla in 1974.

The initial volleyball program lasted for only four seasons, but returned in 2007 with Jason Holt serving as the first head coach.  Holt led the Miners to a pair of GLVC West Division championships and two NCAA Division II regional appearances during an 11-season run with the team, while current head coach Andy Halaz has guided the Miners to 36 wins over his first two seasons, including a 21-win campaign in 2019.

The women's basketball program, which was led by Caruso until 1981, has had only six head coaches in its 47 seasons of existence – the sixth being current first-year head coach Kira Carter.  The Miners made their first significant jump in the 1986-87 season under Mary Ortelee, who took S&T to a school record 19 wins that year and into the top half of the MIAA.  The Miners would remain among the top teams in the conference for a decade under Ortelee and her successor, Linda Roberts, who led the Miners to their first conference regular season title and NCAA Division II Tournament berth in 1996.

Alan Eads succeeded Roberts in the head coaching post in 2002 and brought the Miners back to the NCAA Tournament on two occasions, including the 2007-08 season when S&T went 24-7 and played in the regional championship against eventual national champion Northern Kentucky.  Eads led the Miners to 219 wins during his time as head coach before retiring following the 2019-20 season.

And while the aforementioned Moore got the softball program started, the top moments in program history came in two stretches of time.  One was in the late 1980s and early 1990s as the Miners went deep into the MIAA Tournament in back-to-back years under coaches Julie LeVeck and Tina Costello, and again in the 2000s when Ryan Anderson led S&T to a 41-14 in his first season in 2004 and three years later, the Miners made their first NCAA Tournament appearance in Don Kennedy's first year at the helm.