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Baker University Football News
2003 Season

Former Baker player receives highest assistant coach honor

HILLSBORO, Kan. Ð Mike Gardner, defensive coordinator for the Tabor College Bluejays and former Baker University player, has received the top honor in the nation for assistant coaches.

Gardner has been named an American Football Coaches Association Assistant Coach of the Year.

One assistant coach from each division Ð Division I-A, Division I-AA, Division II, Division III and NAIA Ð is chosen for the AFCA award.

Earlier this season, he earned an AFLAC National Assistant Coach of the Year Award.

GardnerÕs coaching career began at Hastings College from 1990 to 1992. He earned his masterÕs degree and was the special teams and recruiting coordinator at HC. In 1993, Gardner accepted a coaching position at Bethel (Kan.) College as the quarterback/wide receiver coach, and remained there until 1995.

His coaching tenure also includes five years at Lindenwood University where he coached linebackers, defensive line, tight ends, and was the defensive coordinator and special teams coordinator.

Gardner has been involved in leading three programs to the NAIA national playoffs, including Hastings College in 1991 and 1992. Lindenwood University went to the playoffs for the first time in 1998. In his years of coaching, he has recruited or coached 12 All Americans, 15 Academic All Americans and five players who have played professionally.

This year, the Bluejays finished their best season in school history with a 9-2 overall record, securing a second-place finish in the KCAC and a first-ever bid to the NAIA National Football Championship Series where they were defeated by Northwestern Oklahoma State University Ð the same team in which Tabor had to forfeit their 1996 Homecoming game.

AFCA, considered the primary professional association for football coaches at all levels of competition, includes 8,000 members, or more than 90 percent of head coaches at the 680-plus schools that sponsor football at the college level.

Tabor College is a member of the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference (KCAC) and the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA).

Press release courtesy of the Tabor College public relations department. For more information contact Sara Cook at (620) 947-3121 or by e-mail at pr@tabor.edu.