June 2, 2006

The end of a great run

Evergreen Valley High cross country and track & field head coach Frank Slaton retires from coaching

By Diego Abeloos
Editor

After more than 30 years of coaching, Evergreen Valley High coach Frank Slaton is hanging up his whistle and clipboard and calling it a career.

Evergreen Valley High School track and field head coach Frank Slaton, shown here consoling his team’s 100-meter sprinter Yareni Carrasco at the 2006 CCS Finals on May 26. Slaton will retire from coaching at the end of this season after more than 30 years as a coach in cross country, track and field, and football. Photo by Jeff Frazee

And while looking back briefly on his illustrious career, Slaton, 58, summed it up best when he said, “It’s like in the movies. It’s been a good life.”

Slaton said that while his decision to retire from coaching hasn’t truly hit him yet, it surely will in the coming months. Slaton said he plans on teaching P.E. one more year in the 2006-07 school year before officially retiring altogether. Slaton and is wife, Sandy, will soon be moving into a new home in Auburn, where they plan on spending most of their time in retirement.

“Not coaching this summer will feel pretty weird,” said Slaton, who plans on spending the weekdays next year at his parents’ home in the Oakland area while commuting to Evergreen, while spending the weekends in Auburn. “I’m pretty sure, at our new house, my wife will have me doing a lot of other things.”

For Slaton, it’s been a good life that has seen better than half of it spent teaching and coaching young athletes in East San Jose. Slaton began his coaching career in the area in 1973, coaching track and football at Piedmont Hills High School. Just a few short years later, Slaton found himself at Silver Creek High School in the spring of 1977, coaching football and track. Since that time, Slaton has amassed a pair of CCS titles, including his first one in 1977, when both the girls’ and boys’ track teams at Silver Creek won titles.

After more than 20 years sporting Silver Creek’s silver, black and orange colors, Slaton was once again on the move, this time to his final stop at Evergreen Valley High School, which he joined in 2003 to coach cross country and track.
Along the way, Slaton has managed to earn the respect of his peers.

“He’s the guy everyone respects,” said Mt. Pleasant track coach Steve Nelson, who has coached at the school for 20 years. “He’s got the calmest mind I’ve seen and every coach in the league truly respects him.”

The start of a career
Slaton, although known for his coaching, began his career after high school as an athlete, having accepted a football scholarship to San Jose State University in 1966, where he excelled as a kickoff return standout and as a running back and wide receiver. But while at SJSU, Slaton also found a calling in track and field, and promptly joined a team that featured future Olympians John Carlos and Tommy Smith.

“I was the slow guy,” Slaton said. “I was the slowest guy on the team. I was the slow guy in Speed City. But it was good. In 1968, we placed second in the 4x100 relay, behind O.J. Simpson and the team from USC, which was the world record holder.”

After completing his bachelor’s degree in physical education at SJSU, Slaton moved on to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo to earn his master’s degree in the same discipline, while sporadically coaching local schools in the area throughout his tenure at the school.

After a short coaching stint at Piedmont Hills, Slaton then began to make his mark in coaching; beginning with what he said was one of the finest memories of his career – seeing his boys’ and girls’ track team at Silver Creek win CCS titles in 1977. That was the season Slaton also coached future Olympian Andre Phillips, who went on to win gold in the
400-meter hurdles in the 1988 Olympic Summer Games in Seoul, South Korea.

“We were just loaded,” Slaton said of the 1977 teams. “We didn’t win the league; Mt. Pleasant beat us in league for the league championship. But we wound up winning the CCS Championship. We were head and shoulders above everybody.”

Slaton went on to win an additional CCS title in track with the boys’ team in 1998, as well as runner-up honors in CCS competition with both the girls’ and boys’ teams.

Family man
And while Slaton made his mark in coaching, he also made himself into quite the family man. Slaton first met his wife Sandy when the pair was on the Piedmont Hills track team coaching staff. While Slaton moved on to Silver Creek, his wife went on to coach track at Independence. That led to a friendly rivalry with the pair, as Sandy managed to earn bragging rights over her husband by defeating his girls’ teams for four straight years from 1977 through 1980 before giving birth to the couple’s first child, daughter Danielle.

Slaton said one of his greatest memories in coaching was getting the chance to coach his younger daughter, Deanna, in track at Silver Creek during the late 1990s.

Slaton is not only the proud father of his two daughters, but of stepson Christopher Haupert and foster son Ron Jackson, which brings to light the softer side of Slaton’s coaching tenure.

Jackson was in fact one of Slaton’s football players during the coach’s early years at the school. Slaton quickly discovered that Jackson was having a tough time at home with his family and promptly decided to take the young man in his own home as his foster son, much to the surprise of his wife.

“He had a brown paper bag with a little bit of underwear and a few other little things, and that was it,” Slaton said of Jackson. “She (Sandy) was sort of stunned a little bit. But I’ll tell you what, I have probably been the most blessed person in the world because Sandy’s been involved in track and she loves track. She gives me the opportunity to do whatever I need to do, and she’s always there. When Ron came in, she said, ‘no problem.’”

Slaton said he’s happy to have made a difference in his foster son’s life. Slaton said Jackson, now 41, is successful in life with his own family now, and still celebrates Mother’s Days and Father’s Days with Slaton and his wife. Slaton said Jackson has also been able to mend fences with his original family throughout the years.

Looking back and looking ahead
With retirement around the corner, Slaton said he plans on spending time in Auburn with his wife, taking in the leisurely life of hiking and backpacking during their free times. And despite his retirement, Slaton admits he still has the itch to work with kids, adding that he might just be found teaching young local junior high athletes in the Auburn area the finer points of track and field now and then.

In looking back on his career, Slaton unequivocally gives most of the credit to his wife Sandy for allowing him to pursue his passions in life.

“None of this would’ve evolved if it had been anyone else,” Slaton said of his wife. “She’s sort of been the backbone, with myself and the girls. She let me have the opportunity to coach and be involved with other kids.”
As for the difference he made as a coach and teacher, Slaton said the best part of his job has been seeing his students mature as not just athletes, but as people as well.

“To watch them blossom from freshmen, to the day that they graduate and to watch them grow into young men and women, that’s the gratifying part,” Slaton said.

But perhaps the best words about Slaton and his coaching career are best left said by his peers.

“He’s a fantastic coach. You can’t say enough about the guy,” said Leland head track coach Jerry Rose, who has also amassed a coaching career spanning more than 30 years and has known Slaton for quite some time. “He produced great teams at Silver Creek and then turned right around and went to a brand new school at Evergreen and did the same thing over there. He’s always had competitors and he’s a fine coach. …He’s just a fantastic individual. I can’t say enough about the guy. We’re going to miss him in track.”