Coach Austin Archer, the Offensive Coordinator at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, has gone through many different experiences since he began his career as a coach. He originally wanted to become an engineer, but quickly realized his love for football was too strong.
His coaching career took off at a coaching clinic down in Nashville where he met Coach Venne and Pat Cerroni, head coach of the UW-Oshkosh Titans. They told him that he could come coach with them at Oshkosh but didn’t have a full-time job available. So Archer spent his days doing laundry and helping Coach Venne with the offensive line while also going to school for his master’s degree in educational leadership. After a couple years, Archer got promoted to head offensive line coach. Ten years later, he followed Coach Venne to UW-SP where he is now the Offensive Coordinator.
One of the reasons Coach Archer loves football, is the relationship he has with his players. He treats them like family and has made many life time friends with the men he spends everyday with trying to make them better. That’s what makes Coach Archer a great coach, he always makes sure that the good outweighs the bad. He spends hours on top of hours trying to make his players better while also making sure that they
succeed outside of the field. “We don’t just coach football, but help our guys get to graduation,” said Archer. He makes sure his players are succeeding in every aspect of their lives. Not only does he teach them with words, but like you see in the first photo, he uses his hands to show his player how to do the drill the right way. You can see him using himself as a demonstration when one of his players doesn’t do his best on a drill. That’s something only a great coach would be willing to do.
In the second photo, you can see Coach Archer running a drill during spring ball. Spring ball is a nice time for coaches, not too busy but also enough stuff to keep it interesting. That’s something Coach Archer loves about his job, he loves the fact that he doesn’t have to clock in and out
at the same time every day. But still Archer likes to have a plan, so as you can see in his hand, he is holding a practice schedule that everyone on the field follows, even though most days plans are changed a little bit. But being a football coach means you have to be flexible with your schedule. During the season, Archer has to work late into the night and is very busy, but that also means that outside the season they have a lot more free time then someone with an every day 9-5 job.
In the third and final picture, you can see Coach Archer standing next to the linebackers coach, Trent LaCombe. Coach LaCombe used to be a D-Linemen at UWO. When he graduated, he followed Coach Archer and all the other coaches to UWSP. It’s amazing to see the impact football makes on the players involved; for example, Coach Archer once went to one of his old players’ weddings by the name of Alex Wendorf.
At this wedding, Archer noticed that more than half the groomsmen were people who had also played for Archer at UWO.
Archer said, “The fact that the program turned them into life long friends that are now raising kids together and getting married by each other’s side, I was sitting there thinking wow this is neat…that’s what this is all about, that’s why we put in all the hours we do.” Just seeing the men he’s gone through so much with up there together at one of the most memorable moment of some one’s life made him feel proud of all the work he’s put into his career.
Coach Archer is loved and respected by many people in his life, especially his wife Kelsey, who he met through his football journey. She was the athletic trainer for the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. They even got to experience the division 3 national championship together at UWO back in 2016. Now they have a 2-year-old son, Beau Archer, who comes to watch his dad at work at the UWSP football games. Archer works every day at finding ways to improve the pointer football team, and does everything he can to keep the players working hard. At the moment, the pointers are finishing up the spring ball season. Archer and the other coaches are all excited for what’s to come in the fall.
