Former Jackson boys basketball coach Steve Burk reflects on winning era heading into Hall of Fame induction

It had been 39 years since the Jackson boys basketball team won a district basketball title when Steve Burk arrived in 1980.

Burk was packing just four years of coaching experience when he left Chester, Illinois, after serving two years as the boys basketball coach. He was accompanied by his wife, Janice, and two young sons, Kyle and Drew, when he crossed the river, leaving his home state.

He had posted a winning record in his two-year stay at Chester -- not an easy task -- which followed a two-year stint at Francis Howell, where he got his coaching initiation by re-starting the school's girls basketball program. Burk said his family was looking for a bigger town when it pulled up stakes, and thoughts of a return to Missouri aligned with a coaching opening in Jackson, a school where football and wrestling programs were robust, but not so much so in basketball. In fact, Burk was the fifth coach in five years for a basketball program that lacked consistency.

"When we came there, our kids weren't in school yet, and the idea maybe was we'd be there for a few years and maybe look for a different job," said Burk, who had no family ties to the area. "But as we stayed here we grew to enjoy the town and appreciate the school, the town and the people, and we decided that was the place we were going to sink our roots in and stay."

It took just four years for the school to experience the first of four district titles in Burk's 20 seasons. He posted 16 winning seasons, and his teams won five SEMO Conference titles, the University High Christmas Tournament title in 1988 and twice reached the state quarterfinals.

When he finally handed off his whistle after the 1999-2000 season to assistant coach Mike Kiehne, one of 20 of his former players to go on to play at the college level, Burk had compiled a lifetime record of 380-188. The overwhelming majority of those wins came at Jackson, which has continued to accumulate district titles since his tenure.

Burk, who recently retired after 15 years as the scouting and recruiting coordinator at Columbia College, will be formally honored Saturday when he is inducted into the Missouri Basketball Coaches Association's Hall of Fame. He will be one of 11 members that will be inducted at the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in Springfield, Missouri.

He will be inducted with Sam Sides, who Burk he said he went up against on several occasions when Sides coached the Meadow Heights boys in the 1980s.

"Sam is a great coach and a good friend," Burk said. "That's something that makes it even a little better."

In a bit of coincidence, Sides said he applied for the boys coaching position at Jackson when Burk was hired.

"In my mind, he was always a great coach," Sides said. "I tried to watch his practices and watch how he did things. He was very much an X-and-O type of guy, in my mind, and was very discipline oriented. I don't think I was ever quite the disciplinarian that he was. That shows you a different way to do things and still be successful."

Burk, who also taught history at Jackson High School until retiring in 2004, said the honor caught him by surprise.

"It probably as much anything else says something about the young men I coach and the people that actually won the games and did the hard work," Burk said. "I'm happy that their success is being recognized, to be honest."

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Burk carried the demeanor and mentality of a teacher on the sideline, which he roamed with a reserved, soft-spoken style rooted in preparation and the discipline he had instilled in his players.

There was never any doubt about Burk's approach from the start: The players wore the word "Discipline" on the front of their shirts at practices before his first season.

Current Jackson basketball coach Darrin Scott presents postseason awards to his team, one of which is the Coach Burk Hero Award, given to the "player who does the little things that no one else wants to do."

Burk embraces the attention to detail, an attribute that helped his Jackson teams win more than 67 percent of the time.

"Sometimes the little things are the key to winning -- taking a charge, diving on the floor, blocking your guy out. Those kind of things, those were things we felt like were always important," Burk said. "Obviously you need to shoot the ball, rebound and defend, but a lot of people don't recognize how important the little things are -- the pass into the post, those type of things. It's nice of coach Scott to do that."

His deep knowledge of the game earned the respect of coaches on the high school and college levels.

I don't think he got as much credit as he deserved," Sides said. "He was in a big-school class in boys, and it was hard to get out. He was as good a coach, in my mind, as was around here. He's a coach I look up to. I'm sure [the honor] means a lot to him, too, because I don't think he was appreciated as much as he should have been."

Burk built a tight bond with Columbia College coach Bob Burchard, for whom he produced a dependable pipeline of talent over the years. The two met at a high school all-star game in the 1980s. The next year the coaches crossed paths at the Christmas Tournament at the Show Me Center, and when Burk asked Burchard what he was doing there, the Columbia coach said he was looking at Indians point guard Kyle Thoma.

"Kyle was the first guy to go, and then we just started sending some kids," Burk said.

Kiehne, who became a third-team All-American for the NAIA school, became the second to attend Columbia College, and was followed by Cory Thoma, Eric Schweain, Ben Ressel, Jeff Walter and Justin Keen.

Several other colleges benefited from Jackson standouts, including Southeast Missouri State, which signed Mike Lewis, and Western New Mexico, which recruited Charles Thompson.

Jackson, which grew from a Class 3 school to Class 4 -- Missouri's largest at the time -- won its final district title under Burk in 1998, and he turned over the reins to Kiehne, who had been his assistant for three years, after the 1999-2000 season.

The list of players who played for Burk and have pursued coaching, also include David Mirly, Schweain, Seth McDowell and Brad Blackman.

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While Burk has left the high school sideline, he's stayed involved in the sport. His eye for talent was put to good use by Burchard shortly after Burk left the high school sideline.

"Coach Burchard and I were just talking, and I said something to him to the effect, 'If you ever want somebody to go, like, see somebody play or something, I'd do that for you,'" Burk said. "And he was like, 'Really?' He said, 'Well, let me think about that. I'll call you next week.'

"Well, he called me like three days later, and said, 'Hey, I got a job for you. How about doing this and this and this.' And I was like, 'Well, let me ask my wife,' who has always been the power behind the throne, so to speak. She's always been very supportive to basketball, and to me, and sacrificed a lot for me to be a coach. And she said, "Well yeah, if you want to do that, that's fine.' That's how that came about."

With Burk as the recruiting coordinator, Columbia ascended to historic heights. The Cougars reached the NAIA national championship game in 2009 and earned their first No. 1 national ranking in the 2012-13 season, where they had the best record in the nation at 35-0 before losing in the quarterfinals of the national tournament.

He sifted through the talent in Southeast Missouri, Southern Illinois and St. Louis area. His recruits included All-Americans Derrick Dilworth and Devin Griffin, who both starred on the 2013 squad.

And the Jackson pipeline remains. Jackson graduate John Meyer is currently on the Columbia roster and will be a senior next year.

"Steve has made such a positive impact on our program for the past 15 years," Burchard said in a press release put out by the school that addressed Burk's selection to the MBCA Hall of Fame. "He helped identify and recruit 'right fit' student-athletes to Columbia College, scouted opponents, served as a master teacher in practice, and always was a calming presence on the sideline."

Burk deflects praise with his humble style that he's maintained throughout the years.

"Sometimes it worked despite what I was doing," Burk said. "Coach Burchard is a great coach and we've had some very good assistants there. They were able to help me do my job."

Burchard, already a member of the MBCA Hall of Fame, will be presented with the Gary Filbert Lifetime Achievement Award at the ceremony.

As far as his own playing days, Burk, adamantly claims "I wasn't by any means any better than an average high school player," and he credits two of his coaches at Piasa High School, Jim Hinkle and Dick Well, for influencing and encouraging him to get into coaching. He passed on a chance to play Division III basketball and instead plotted his course in education by obtaining his bachelor and master degrees from SIU Edwardsville.

"I was interested in athletics and I wanted to be a history teacher, and I wanted to coach, and I was very fortunate," Burk said. "I'm one of not a lot of people that got to do exactly what they wanted to do. And I'm very grateful for that."

It's never been about Steve Burk, which has been his signature of his teams who played with an unselfish style. And with a big day of recognition ahead, Burk wants to make sure every member of his team shares the honor.

"I want to mention how important my family was to me, and how supportive they were," Burk said. "My two sons and my wife, because they were very important."