Mad Dogs & Engilman : Sylmar Football Coach Tagged for Rabid Style, but Off the Field He Is, Well, Man’s Best Friend

A Sylmar High football player misses a block. The eagle-eyed head coach spots the missed assignment. “You stink. You choked. You’re a worthless . . .,” Jeff Engilman yells from the sideline, face red with anger.

Another player drops a pass. He knows the routine: “You stink. You choked. You’re a worthless . . .,” Engilman screams, eyes seeming to pop from their sockets, jaw jutting bulldog fashion.

Senior tackle Martin Duran has nightmares about him. Senior linebacker Tyrone Pierce, who towers over Engilman by six inches, refers to him as “the meanest, scariest person you’ve ever met.”

Mean and scary, yet one of the most important, caring people in Pierce’s life, a description that holds true for many of Engilman’s former players.

Off the field, he is a friend, his players say. Ask his advice, the response will be educated and thoughtful. Tease him until your sides ache. On the field, do as he tells you and do it enthusiastically--or else.

On Friday night, he attacks the game with a watchdog’s vengeance. Yet during the week on campus he has the disposition of a puppy.

Linda Ambro, Sylmar principal, fielded a complaint this season from a woman who overheard a practice session and expressed concern that Engilman was “hurting his players’ feelings.” The woman was told her worries were needless. For her part, Ambro is proud of the football program Engilman has built. Raving madman and all.

“In all candor, I enjoy watching Jeff during the game as much as the game itself because he is so intense and so involved,” Ambro said.

This is Engilman football. Love it or leave it, he says. He has been coaching this way since 1974. He would sooner leave the profession than change his approach.

“Every coach has their own style of coaching,” he said. “I wish I was like Tom Landry on the sideline, but I can’t be that way.”

This season, Engilman football is effective football. Sylmar, the City Section 4-A Division champion, is 13-0 entering tonight’s CIF/Reebok Bowl against Bishop Amat (14-0), the Southern Section Division I champion.

Engilman, 42, is a perfectionist. He is a relentless, unforgiving taskmaster with a violent temper. And he is not one to hide emotion. The smallest mistake sets him off.

“You’ve gotta be a strong person,” Pierce said. “Some people, he will break them down. He’ll make them cry. There have been individual ballplayers who have gone on to college--Division I schools--that he’s broken down. I’ve witnessed it.”

Engilman’s motivational techniques, although not uncommon in a game as violent as football, tend to the extreme--so much so that in April, 1985, he was fired as the Grant football coach for allegedly drawing female genitalia on a blocking dummy and ordering players to use the drawing as a target during spring drills.

His style might be unorthodox, but it engenders loyalty among assistant coaches and players.

“Everybody looks at the yelling and screaming out here on Friday night, but basically there’s more to the man,” said Darryl McIntyre, the defensive coordinator. “He’s a competitive soul. He wants to win. He wants his kids to do their best at all times.”

Engilman, a graduate of Poly High and Cal State Northridge, entered coaching 18 years ago at Poly. He has been posting winning seasons and influencing players since.

After three years as an assistant at Poly, he moved to Manual Arts and he and co-Coach Steve Landress guided the Toilers to 3-A City titles in 1983 and ’84.

Under Engilman’s tutelage, Sylmar is 51-14-1 in six years, including 33-3 the past three seasons. This year’s City championship is Sylmar’s first.

It is a given that at least some Sylmar players will feel Engilman’s wrath during tonight’s game. Still, win or lose, the stinging words will be forgotten by game’s end.

“He’s a nice guy,” senior wide receiver John Gaitanis said. “You can talk to him like a friend.”

Said senior linebacker Anthony Murray: “After a while, you understand that he’s just trying to make you better.”

Engilman understands his demeanor can intimidate players, especially newcomers. When senior quarterback Deon Price joined the team in the spring, Engilman reasoned the unsure player needed a warning.

“The first thing I told Deon, I said, ‘Deon, don’t let me get to you or you’ll be ruined,’ ” Engilman said.

Players have no problem approaching Engilman off the field. Senior strong safety Mike Anderson, once terrified by Engilman’s game face, never hesitates to seek his coach’s advice on how to handle personal problems.

Said Pierce: “After you get to know him, he’s one of the nicest, coolest coaches you could ever be around.”

Ambro has seen Engilman help wayward students--not only football players--who might otherwise have dropped out of school or joined a gang.

“They just love him,” the Sylmar principal said. “They’re all over him like puppies during lunch period. They can’t get enough of him. He’s like this big papa bear.”

Over the years, Engilman has been a father figure to many students, several of whom never knew their fathers or rarely saw them. James McGee, a former player, was one such student.

McGee was a sophomore linebacker at Sylmar when Engilman took over the program in 1987. He spent much of his free time roaming the streets and causing trouble with neighborhood friends.

The conversation Engilman had with McGee was like that of many others he has had in 17 years of coaching at City schools.

“I said, ‘James, you could either be good as a gang-banger or you could be good as a football player, but you can’t be both,’ ” Engilman said. “There’s too many loyalties.”

McGee chose football. It was understood that if Engilman caught McGee associating with any gang member, he was off the team. Engilman monitored McGee’s classroom attendance each day. Each of his teachers verified his attendance with a signature and comment. “I call them attitude checks,” Engilman said.

McGee progressed both on and off the field. Then, one day after school, McGee went home to an empty apartment. His mother had abandoned him. Suddenly on his own, he dropped out of school. A few days later, after hearing what had happened to McGee, Engilman tracked him down at his job.

“I got in my truck, drove over there, and said, ‘You quit your job right now. You’re going back to school. I’ll find a place for you to live,’ ” Engilman said.

And he did. The parents of a player volunteered to take in McGee for a nominal monthly rental fee. McGee earned the money doing odd jobs around Engilman’s five-acre farm in Acton. McGee was an all-league linebacker his senior year.

“Jeff directed him (away from gangs),” McIntyre said. “He brought consistency, some stability to the kid’s life. The kid committed himself to football--committed himself to Jeff--and Jeff in turn committed himself to him. (McGee) is one of our best success stories.”

Their relationship didn’t end there. Shortly after graduation, McGee joined the Marines. Last spring, McGee spent a six-week furlough with Engilman and his wife, Madeline, on their farm. McGee surprised Engilman last week by attending Sylmar’s City championship victory over Carson.

“He’s like a son of mine,” Engilman said.

The Engilmans have no children, but Jeff is constantly busy keeping students such as McGee on the straight and narrow.

“He’s the type of man who gives out his home phone (number) and tells kids to call whenever they need to,” Madeline said. “He tells them to call collect. And believe me, they do.”

The image of a sweet, caring man is difficult to square with that of a ranting coach patrolling the Sylmar sideline. But every emotion has a time and place for Engilman.

When Sylmar plays at Poly, win or lose, Engilman takes his wife by the hand and leads her to a precise location in the stadium to re-enact the first kiss the two shared nearly 20 years ago.

That is also why Engilman refused to wear a microphone for tonight’s televised CIF/Reebok Bowl. He knows better.

“I might incriminate myself,” he cracked.