The short story of Josh Roop’s upcoming induction into the Illinois High School Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame is told in numbers. In 19 seasons, his Tri-Valley High School teams have won 76 percent of their games, highlighted by a state championship and two runner-up finishes. A 156-49 record includes 16 trips to the playoffs.
Roop understands wins and losses are a reality of the job, that coaches are measured largely by them. Yet, early in his tenure, when a superintendent was giving him “a hard time,” Roop passionately laid out his priorities for Tri-Valley football.
“I said, ‘I’m here to make a difference in your kids,’” Roop said.
He was just getting started.
“I said, ‘If all we do is win football games while I’m here, then that’s pretty trivial. You can hire a monkey to do that. We’re here to make an impact … better husbands, better fathers, better sons.’”
The longer and more telling story of Roop’s Hall of Fame path is rooted there, in the belief a coach’s influence must go beyond totals on a scoreboard. For Roop, it also is rooted in faith, the kind that turns a selfish husband, father and coach into a better version of himself. Roop will tell you that to be the coach he is, the man he is, he first had to find God.
It was a journey of many layers, beginning in December 2001 when Roop, while on Christmas break, traveled to LeRoy each day to help his mother in-law, Karen Hunley, care for his father in-law.
Dave Hunley was diagnosed with cancer at age 45, given six months to live. Two years later, he was in hospice, no longer able to speak or feed himself. Roop helped feed and care for him. Occasionally, his father in-law would raise his hand to God as Christian music played.
“I’m there every day and I’m watching this man at the end of his life,” Roop said. “It’s wearing on my mother in-law. It’s wearing on our family. So Karen at one point said, ‘It just seems like he’s waiting on something.’”
Roop asked if he could speak to Dave alone.
“I closed the door, and I can’t remember if I was talking to him or God, but I said, ‘Dave, it’s OK to go. I’m going to become a better person, I’m going to be a better husband to your daughter, I’m going to be a better father to your grandkids, I’m going to start going to church.’’” Roop said.
Soon after, on January 7, 2002, Dave Hunley died. He was 47.
Roop made a promise. Now, he must carry it through.
“A year went by. I started going to church, I started to do things better,” he said. “But I still hadn’t committed my life (to God). I’m still in the bars, still not coaching the right way, still not doing things the right way. I’m still selfish.”
‘Now or never’
On January 6, 2003, eve of the one-year anniversary of Dave Hunley’s death, Roop suffered a herniated disc in his lower back. In an ambulance enroute to the hospital, this happened.
“I won’t say I heard a voice, but just had this presence, ‘I gave you a year and for you, it’s now or never,’” Roop said.
Later, at the hospital, he told his aunt, “I know why this happened. I’ve been a really selfish person and I need to do some things differently.’ I ended up four days in the hospital and for those four days, God showed me my biggest fear and that was to die alone.”
In traction, Roop was sent home. Soon, he had surgery, then was home for four to six weeks, alone much of the day.
“I’m broken. God’s working on me,” he said. “One day, I’m lying in bed and saying, ‘God, you’ve got me, but I don’t know what to do. You’re going to have to show me what to do.’”
Two days later, Darren Hess, Roop’s friend and fellow assistant football coach at Normal Community, called to say he had been hired as head coach at Normal West. He asked Roop to join him as his offensive coordinator.
Roop accepted. It changed his life.
Early on, as an assistant at LeRoy and Normal Community, the Illinois State graduate said his focus was on wins and losses, Xs and Os. At Normal West, surrounded by what he called “godly men,” his focus became “relationships and making a difference in the kids.”
Roop was influenced by Dirk Smid, a former U High head coach who was serving as West’s quarterbacks coach. Smid’s cancer, which ultimately was fatal, was in remission at the time. He quickly became a mentor to Roop.
“He was teaching me how to be a Christian man … a better husband, better father,” Roop said. “He really changed my outlook on things.”
Roop also began to attend bible study sessions with some fellow coaches, including Smid and Duane Thoennes, as well as Bobbie Monroe, West's athletic director.
Leaving comfort zone
Roop was in a good place, teaching at Kingsley Junior High and in a positive environment at Normal West. Then, the Tri-Valley head coaching job opened and Roop wondered what it would be like to coach in his hometown, at his alma mater.
His wife, Bridget, had reservations, fearing that without the support he had at Normal West, her husband would “go back to who I was,” Roop said.
They attended a church service in Farmer City. A guest speaker called the Roops to the front, laid his hands on them and said, “God wants you to know there are changes coming your way. You don’t need to worry or be scared about it because peoples’ lives are going to be changed by the decisions that you two make.”
The date was January 7, anniversary of Dave Hunley’s death. Roop applied for the Tri-Valley position and took over as head coach in 2007.
“I came into the job with a lot of confidence and a lot of belief that I was sent here and I was led here to do this to make a difference,” he said.
That came through in his interview with then-athletic director Brian Knutson. A former head football coach, Knutson knew what he wanted in the Vikings’ next coach.
He found it in Roop.
“When he interviewed, he was very powerful,” Knutson said. “He had a plan and sincerity. He is so sincere in everything he does. He was very confident in what he was going to do and how he was going to do it.
“We had some really good candidates, but he shined through. It’s the best hire I ever made. Look what he’s done."
Gabe Cripe was a sophomore quarterback and defensive back in Roop’s first season. He and his teammates saw the new coach “set the culture” immediately.
Roop had the Vikings doing 6 a.m. workouts and, Cripe said, “He always asked that we get there 15 minutes early.”
The result?
“It weeded people out,” Cripe said. “We lost some of our better athletes. But I think Coach Roop wanted to find the people who were committed to rebuilding the program.”
Big picture
Of the 14 seniors who attended the first workout, four finished the season. The Vikings went 4-5 after a 1-8 season the previous year. They made the playoffs the next two seasons, setting in motion an ascent to a state runner-up finish in 2013, a state championship in 2015 and a runner-up showing in 2022.
All the while, Roop emphasized the big picture.
“A lot of coaches, especially when they work with high school kids, will say it’s more important what happens off the field. Coach Roop absolutely means it,” Cripe said. “He was thinking about our futures and our long term before we were thinking about our long term. He would talk about what we needed to be doing to make sure we were good husbands and fathers and members of the community.”
Cripe is a married father of two and an attorney in the Cincinnati area. He thinks of Roop as “the foundation for that.”
None of it surprises Hess, a 2022 inductee into the IHSFCA Hall of Fame. He considers Roop “much more deserving of the Hall of Fame than I was.”
“He’s from that community, he knows the people and he knows the culture,” Hess said. “He has very high expectations and has a great way of making those kids deliver. He’s just a good person. He works on those relationships and holds kids accountable.”
Roop doesn’t let go once a player graduates. Cripe said Josh and Bridget Roop “do a good job of keeping us all within the program and within the culture.”
Josh Roop “reaches out to us a lot on a group chat,” Cripe said. Bridget Roop will “post things on social media like, ‘Shoutout to the guys who started the program.’ They certainly don’t have to do that. That’s special to me.”
The Roops have two grown children: a son, Peyton, who was a senior two-way star on the 2015 title team, and a daughter, Taylor, a nurse in Peoria. A lot of former players feel like family as well.
“My wife has been in it with me,” Josh said. “She’s an assistant coach almost. It’s been our mission field. She’s just as significant to them as I have been.”
The IHSFCA induction ceremony is March 28 in Champaign. Later that day, starting at 6 p.m., the public is invited to a celebration for Josh Roop at Gameday Grill in Downs.
Many in attendance will have learned football from him … and a lot more.
“I love this game so much because there are so many opportunities for life lessons,” Roop said. “You’re going to have an opportunity in every game to decide if you’re going to quit. Is this guy going to whip me all night? Am I going to give up? What’s going to push me? It has to be that guy next to me.
“You teach them that because at some point they’re going to have their family counting on them. You use this game to prepare them.”
