The Windsor High School athletic department has a new leader and for the first time in many years, the position won’t include non-athletic duties, such as doubling as an assistant principal.
Tom Ludwig, 37, has worked in the school district for five years as the director of Windsor’s alternative school. Ludwig was named the Owls’ new A.D. earlier this month by the Windsor C-1 Board of Education.
Ludwig’s first official day in the post won’t be until July 1, but he was already helping interim athletic director Kevin Stoffey supervise a pair of events on campus Jan. 19 – girls basketball vs. Festus and a wrestling triangular meet against Pacific and Priory.
Stoffey, who retired from teaching in 2011 but stayed on to serve as the wrestling team’s head coach, agreed to take over as A.D. for this school year after former athletic director Jason Naucke moved up to the principal’s job. Stoffey was on the selection committee that recommended Ludwig.
“I’ve known Tom for five or six years,” Stoffey said after the wrestling meet, in which he recorded the 200th dual meet victory of his career. “He’s a good guy who’s very knowledgeable about sports. He’s got a lot of common sense and I think he works well with people.”
Ludwig said the biggest challenge the school’s athletic department faces is hiring a head coach for football. Greg Westermayer, an assistant principal at Windsor Middle School, stepped down as the Owls’ head coach in November after a seven-year run.
Stoffey said the district will start interviewing coaching candidates in late January. “I’m guessing by the February board meeting, they’ll take a name to the board,” Stoffey said of the coach selection committee. “There are some good candidates. There are four in-house and a half dozen from the outside.”
The athletic director job at Windsor has been in flux for the past two years. Naucke served as both principal and athletic director at Windsor for most of the 2015-16 school year, while principal David Gilmore was on a leave of absence to battle cancer. Gilmore died last fall and Naucke handed the A. D. duties to Stoffey.
Ludwig, who lives in Hillsboro with his wife and two children, graduated from Mehlville in 1998 and played football for William Jewell College in Liberty, where he later coached for a few years. He taught at North Kansas City High School for one year and taught government and world history at Festus for seven years, also serving there as an assistant coach for football and track. He’s spent the last 13 years in education.
Reaching students who were at risk from dropping out of school and leading them down a path to graduation at the alternative school gave Ludwig an enormous sense of satisfaction.
“We’ve had some success there,” he said. “We’ve had quite a few kids come in and graduate who did not have that option. I’ll miss seeing those kids come to the school with a chance to succeed in an avenue different (than) if they were in a traditional high school setting.”
Ludwig said he and Stoffey talk almost every day, with the veteran coach quick to show him the ropes. Over the next few months, Ludwig will learn all about spring sports.
Stoffey said the ideal athletic director serves as a coach for the coaches. And what is his advice for Ludwig?
“Be good to your wife because you’re going to be putting a lot of time in,” Stoffey said. “He’s already got a good head on his shoulders and knows how to deal with people.”