Palatine boys cross country head coach Chris Quick hoists the Pirates’ 2011 Class 3A first place trophy. Quick, St. Francis’ Scott Nelson and Hinsdale Central’s Jim Westphal have been selected for induction into the Illinois Track and Cross Country Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2025.
Daily Herald file
Three local favorites have been selected for induction into the Illinois Track and Cross Country Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2025.
St. Francis’ Scott Nelson, Palatine’s Chris Quick and Hinsdale Central’s Jim Westphal will be honored during the annual ITCCCA clinic Jan. 11 in Itasca.
“It’s a great feeling,” said Nelson, 62, who wore his feelings on his blue windbreaker sleeve for 35 years as a coach of Spartans boys and girls track and cross country teams. He’s in his 37th year teaching at St. Francis with no plans to stop.
Between the neon orange ball cap Nelson wore and his loud, raspy encouragement of his athletes, one could always tell St. Francis was at a meet.
It wasn’t for show. Nelson’s heart was genuinely invested in the thousands of athletes he coached. They repaid him with 95 state medals, 71 conference titles and 39 state cross country teams.
Before St. Francis built a proper track he swept and shoveled the school parking lot to create paths for his runners. After the 400-meter oval was laid, in 2013 it was dedicated in Nelson’s name at the request of donors whose children he coached.
“I’ll be honest, I’m pretty quiet about things like this, but this one means quite a bit,” Nelson said of the ITCCCA honor.
“First of all,” he said, “a colleague nominates you, it’s not picked on who you know or what you know. It’s how you help the kids.”
Chris Quick, 48, knows how that goes.
The former Palatine cross country coach and track distance coach ran for his own father, Jeff Quick, at Moline High School, captain of his dad’s team in 1993.
Chris Quick will join his father in the ITCCCA hall, among similar pairings such as Roy and Ron Gummerson, and Ron, Ken and Don Helberg.
Chris Quick’s junior son, Christopher, will be competing at Peoria’s Detweiller Park on Saturday for the boys Class 3A cross country final.
“He’s going be the third generation from our family to run in the state final,” Chris Quick said.
He coached superstars like Matt Smoody and Steve Finley and “was lucky,” he said, to learn from Pirates coaches Fred Miller, Steve Currins and Chaille Gleason, hall of famers all.
Quick’s 2011 squad won the Class 3A cross country title. He founded Distance Night in Palatine, a premier April track meet that draws elite runners not only from Illinois but nationally.
As Quick aged into fatherhood — Christopher, Palatine senior Madeline and 13-year-old J.J. — in 2020 he started the Palatine Pack Timing and youth running club.
“I needed to reorient around values that were not related to ‘winning,’” he said.
“Now, of course, what I’m learning is we focus on having fun, teaching fundamentals and building a community, and if you do that it turns out you win anyway.”
Jim Westphal, 55, has done that consistently.
In 1986 at Oak Park-River Forest he placed fourth in Class AA cross country. The next spring he won the AA 3200-meter run.
A member of Loyola University’s hall of fame, he was a four-time track All-American, fourth at the Division I meet in the 10,000 as a senior in 1992.
Westphal coached Hinsdale Central to the cross country state finals each season from 2010-23. That reign included Class 3A titles in 2013 and 2014 and runner-up finishes in 2021 and 2022.
In track or cross country, he directed Red Devils standouts such as two-time champion Dan Watcke and three-time champ Aden Bandukwala.
Westphal credited cross country assistants Jim Kupres, Noah Lawrence and John Snee, plus the great girls coach and ITCCCA hall of famer Mark McCabe.
“I’m incredibly humbled by the acknowledgment,” Westphal said. “In all honesty, coaching such wonderful kids is an honor. Any type of recognition the adults receive is a direct byproduct of all the kids’ hard work and commitment.”
Going above and beyond
Kathy Craig
Kathy Craig, coordinator of Special Olympics at Hinsdale South High School in Darien, was recognized in September with Illinois Special Olympics’ “Above and Beyond Award.”
Her area of Special Olympics jurisdiction includes 100 adult recreation agencies and schools within DuPage, Kane and Kendall counties.
“I was surprised. I was not expecting it,” said Craig, who has taught in Hinsdale South’s deaf and hard of hearing program for 24 years.
Formerly a coach of the school’s Special Olympics basketball, soccer, and track and field programs, Craig said her current position is similar to an athletic director. She monitors facilities, game workers and is an assistant coach for those sports plus swimming and bowling, where she remains head coach as bowling as a summer activity.
Also the sponsor of Hinsdale South’s Deaf Academic Bowl team, for 15 years Craig has been involved in Hornets wrestling, reflecting a lifelong interest in the sport. Now-retired hall of fame coach Mike Matozzi asked her to help, and she volunteered.
“The kids refer to me as, like, the team mom,” Craig said.
Illinois Special Olympics particularly liked Craig’s hosting Special Olympics soccer and tennis tournaments, which provide competition to coed participants 7 years old and up.
With athletic director Art Ostrow’s support, in April Hinsdale South annually hosts 30 soccer teams for a daylong tournament, and in June it hosts about 75 tennis players.
“I really think Special Olympics is a great avenue for our special education students to showcase their athletic abilities, their teamwork and a way to get involved in the school, that’s why I promote it so hard. It’s a big deal at our school,” Craig said.