Charles Zanders left behind a career in social work to earn a teaching degree and focus more intensely on his coaching career.
But the Hoover boys’ basketball coach knows his days as a social worker are far from over.
“When you get a head coaching job, people don’t tell you about the other part of it, the outside factors you always have to deal with,” he said. “My social work background helped me deal with the issues we’ve had at school. Although I’m not titled a social worker, I’m still a social worker/coach.”
For Zanders, coaching basketball has always been about sharing his love of the sport with youth and using it as a method for teaching life lessons. One of his first coaching experiences came through his work at a community center, where he organized youth basketball programs. His work there led to his first paid coaching job at Des Moines Roosevelt. He returned to Hoover, his alma mater, in 1997 and is in his fifth year as head coach.
“It’s been an awesome feeling because I get to come back to my school, and not many people get to do that,” Zanders said. “Number two, I absolutely love the fact that I’m in a position where I could mentor, teach, and be an example for a lot of kids in our community and neighborhood. Basketball is a small part of it.” Zanders graduated from Hoover in 1987 and was a starter on the basketball team as a junior and senior, helping his team to the state tournament both years. He was the Huskies’ leading scorer and rebounder and was a two-time all conference selection and received all area and honorable mention all state honors. He played for two years at Iowa Central Community College on a team that advanced to the national tournament during his second year.
He attended Grand View College and landed in the social work field, working at the YMCA and other community centers. His efforts were focused on working with youth with behavior problems, social skill development and family therapy. Most recently, he was the assistant executive director at Willkie House Inc., which serves low-income youth and their families through a variety of programs.
Outside of the community center environment, his first coaching job was as the freshman coach at Roosevelt. Though he always loved basketball and working with children, he, to that point, had never aspired to coach.
Today, however, coaching has become a focal point in his life. Sharing time between coaching and his career in social work was time consuming – he worked during the day, went to practice, and then went back to work at night – and he believed that, in order to be a successful coach, he needed to be in the same building as his players.
He enrolled at Simpson College in January 2007 and will graduate in May with a teaching degree. He plans to teach physical education and hopes to receive a special education endorsement.
Zanders would eventually like to move on to the college level, but said “I’m happy at Hoover, and it will take a good situation for me to consider leaving.” As head coach, he has compiled a 71-25 career and led the Huskies to a state title in 2006 with a 26-0 record. Nine players from that championship team graduated, leaving a huge void at the start of the 2006- 2007 season. Hoover went 11-10 last year, but Zanders said this year’s team, marked by athleticism and “solid basketball IQ,” has made improvements. Hoover was 4-3 at the start of winter break, having lost to three ranked opponents.
Jermaine Woods and Robert Patton are the Huskies’ lone returning starters from last year’s team. Patton, a senior center, has been the team’s most consistent player. “He has a warrior’s mentality,” Zanders said. Sophomore point guard Quincy King has already received attention from the Division I level.
But Zanders learned through his years in social work that basketball is only a piece of the puzzle when it comes to working with players. He hopes his players learn a little about life along the way, too.
“My goal is to come in and educate kids about life, about academics and about basketball,” he said. “We have a saying here in our program where our kids are expected to take care of three things: take care of home, take care of school, and take care of your community. You take care of those things, and life tends to work itself out pretty nice.”