By Harry Minium
NORFOLK, Va. – Win or lose, the same scene plays out after every Old Dominion home football game in the south end zone at S.B. Ballard Stadium.
The wives, girlfriends and more than a dozen kids of ODU's coaches converge there. Yes, there are post-game interviews to do with the media, postgame meetings with players, recruits to socialize with and game film to watch.
But as much as possible, family comes first at ODU.
Inge Seiler brings her three kids, Elle, Brynn and Riggs, onto the field, and they all rush into the arms of their dad, defensive coordinator Blake Seiler.
Head coach Ricky Rahne's two boys, Ryder and Jake, generally sprint onto the field to find their father, and almost knock him over, sometimes before he can shake the opposing coach's hand. Jen Rahne is not far behind them and hugs and kisses her husband.
Prior to a recent game, Ryder suffered a concussion playing hockey. He was told to take it easy for a few days, but after the Monarchs defeated Louisiana Tech on a last-second Nick Rice field goal, he nonetheless sprinted after his dad.
"I was chasing after him saying, 'Jake, don't run, you've got a concussion,'" Jen Rahne said. "But it didn't stop him."
Lauren Campbell carries her 20-month-old daughter, Riley, onto the field, who runs away when Rahne approaches her (she's shy around men), but runs into the arms of her dad, Kirk Campbell, ODU's offensive coordinator.
Sage Lucas, the infant daughter of running backs coach Tony Lucas, and his wife, Natasha, isn't as shy of men and embraces Rahne. Neither is Lexan, son of tight ends coach Fontel Mines and his wife, Joyner.
It is always an endearing thing to see.
"This is just an awesome," Athletic Director Wood Selig said as he surveyed the scene after a recent game. "This is something you don't see very often."
It isn't. It's the first time I've seen an athletic team at any level embrace family values in this fashion in my four decades of as a sports writer, and after watching the Monarchs this season, I wonder why it isn't embraced everywhere.
Coaching is a demanding profession. The pressure to win is relentless and beyond practice, meetings and watching video, recruiting never ends. ODU's coaches arrive in the early morning and usually don't get at home until after the kids have gone to bed.
The day after ODU concludes its regular season with a home game Saturday against Charlotte, coaches hit the road for a week of recruiting. Then, if the Monarchs defeat Charlotte, they will begin preparations for a bowl game.
That's one of many reasons why Rahne has an open-door policy when it comes to families. They are not only welcome on the field following games, but are welcome at the L.R. Hill Sports Complex and practice fields every day.
Lauren Campbell has often driven an hour, roundtrip, from their East Beach home, so that Riley can see her father just for a few minutes.
"It means so much for Riley and for Kirk to have five minutes together they otherwise wouldn't normally have," she said.
This focus on family values isn't just for husbands, wives and children. It's also for ODU's more than 100 players.
Some ODU football players are from broken homes and even those who aren't say it has had a positive effect on them to see coaches playing with their kids and hugging their wives.
Mines grew up without a father, and when he sees his 18-month-old son walking around, exchanging high fives with players, "it's always a surreal moment.
"I did not have my dad around. I never met my dad," he said. "A lot of our guys grew up in similar situations. It's up to us to show them how to be a husband, how to be a father."
That extends to Thanksgiving Day, when all of the football players without family in town were to eat dinner with the families of coaches.
A former University of Virginia and NFL player, Mines coached at East Carolina, James Madison, Richmond and Chowan before coming to ODU.
"Hands down this is the most my wife and son have ever been around me at work," he said.
"Anytime I get a chance to see my son during the daylight fills my heart with joy."
Rahne's family values were instilled by his parents and family is clearly his No. 1 priority. He hasn't held a press conference, or done a post-game interview, in which he hasn't spoken about family.
After ODU won its first game this season against Hampton, Rahne choked up when talking about Jen Rahne.
"She's the best person on the planet," he said.
But the impetus for ODU's family values came from Rahne's time with James Franklin, for whom he coached at Vanderbilt and then Penn State. Franklin encouraged wives, girlfriends and kids to become part of the program.
"At Vanderbilt, we had dinner with the players two nights a week," Jen Rahne said. "I'm a firm believer that when players see a coach with their kids, they understand that he's a dad, he's a family man, and he really wants what's best for us."
The pandemic has forced Rahne to cut back on some of the gatherings he would have liked to have had. But as the pandemic subsided and the season progressed, players have become frequent guests for dinner with every coach.
The wives make cookies for players and gave them Halloween treats. On their birthdays, they all get a birthday doughnut. Everyone gets cookies or brownies after a victory.
Senior linebacker Jordan Young said he's often been to the Seiler house and that he has Inge's cell phone and will reach out to her on occasion.
"Whatever we need, we can always count on a coach or a family member," he said. "We can always reach out to them and talk to them.
"It's so awesome that they want to have us around their kids. It makes the guys step out of their comfort zones."
There are also designated times each week when Rahne insists his coaches leave the office and go home. On Thursday afternoons, the offices close after practice. Sunday mornings are also free.
An hour or so is set aside on Mondays for wives to come have dinners with their husbands in the office.
Seiler came to ODU from West Virginia and took a pay cut to work for Rahne, whom he worked with at Kansas State. He said Rahne's focus on family values "is everything to me."
Coaching, he said, "can divide families. I had opportunities to work elsewhere but I came here because of coach Rahne, not only to get this program back to winning, but also so that I can be on a staff of husbands and fathers
"You have a short window to raise your kids. You need to be able to see your kids."
It's important to both Blake and Inge that their children not only see their dad at work but also at church. After ODU returned to Norfolk from a game at UTEP earlier this season long after sunrise, Blake Seiler was with his family attending mass at Norfolk's Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church at 8:30 a.m.
Only after mass did he take a nap.
"You hear horror stories at some other schools, where no one is allowed in the offices but the players and players," Blake Seiler said. "What we have here is unusual and a true blessing."
Lauren Campbell worked at Penn State for five seasons, first as a graphic designer, then as the director of social media and creative content, and quickly fell in love with Franklin's focus on family.
"The team and program functioned as a big family," she said.
"Everyone cared about each other. It wasn't all about football. It was about being there for everyone."
While working at Penn State, she began dating Kirk, who at the time was the offensive coordinator at Alderson Broaddus, located in Lauren's hometown of Philippi, West Virginia.
"He met coach Franklin and eventually, coach Franklin asked Kirk to become an offensive analyst," Lauren said. "At Penn State, it was all about relationships, about good relationships with good people.
"Ricky has brought that same philosophy here. Ricky leads by example. He's such a great father and great husband."
Cornerbacks coach Leon Wright learned about that philosophy first hand when his girlfriend, Donna Webb, had their first child, Lennox Ray Webb Wright, a few weeks early on the night before the Monarchs hosted Florida Atlantic.
It was a huge game for the Monarchs, who had not beaten FAU since 2016 and yet Rahne told him to stay with his girlfriend and newborn child.
"When I called Ricky, he didn't hesitate," Wright said. "He said 'take care of your family. We've got this.'
"A lot of people talk about their family. Ricky walks the walk."
While most of ODU's coaches were pretty good athletes, their wives have a better composite athletic resume.
"I'd put our wives against any other team's wives in a heartbeat," Jen Rahne said.
Assistant defensive coordinator and safeties coach Remington Rebstock learned how talented his wife, Alex, was when they visited Kansas University.
"We walked into the KU softball facility and there was a full-sized wall mural, a trophy case and a mannequin," he said. "She was a four-year starter and captain.
"I knew she was good. I didn't realize she was that good."
Alex Jones Rebstock started in 199 of 201 games in the outfield and 41 more as a pitcher. She had a .303 career batting average and a 2.99 career ERA.
Blake Seiler also married a ringer. Inge Jorgensen Seiler was a two-time track and field All-American at the University of Virginia and won a national championship in the javelin. She was a four-time All-ACC pick.
"She's definitely the better athlete," Blake said.
Joanna Baird Reihner, wife of offensive line coach Kevin Reihner, was a swimming and track and cross country star in high school and at the University of Delaware, but perhaps is a bigger star today than ever. She's a highly renowned long-distance runner.
"She'll run a marathon and then show up for the football game as if she hasn't done anything all day," said Jen Rahne, who was a pretty good volleyball player at Cornell.
Jo, Alex and Inge are all fitness instructors.
Lauren Campbell was a standout volleyball, basketball and softball player in high school, where she was also in the drum line, but turned down scholarship offers from smaller schools because they did not offer the graphic design major that she wanted.
She and Kirk hit it off, she said, "because of our love for sports."
Joyner Mines met Fontel at UVA and was a social worker before she was bitten by the fitness bug. She's now a certified yoga, palates, and fitness trainer and works for Alex Rebstock at Orange Theory Fitness in Ghent.
She's also taken up running. She lost her mother a year ago to cancer and the last two weekends, ran half marathons in her honor, finishing in less than two hours.
Even the wives and girlfriends who weren't athletes have impressive backgrounds. Natasha Harrison Lucas is a doctor and Katie Smith, wife of special teams coach Kevin Smith, is a nurse.
Meredith Cooper Galt, the wife of Director of Sports Performance Dwight Galt IV, is a physician's assistant with Sentara. She was a cheerleader at the University of Maryland.
Donna Webb, Leon Wright's girlfriend, is a veterinarian who was a cheerleader at Duke.
Wide receivers coach Mark Dupuis isn't yet married, but is engaged to Jess Harbold, a manager at a local KinderCare daycare center. And yes, she's a part of the ODU family.
Tim Kovacs, ODU's director of football operations, said Rahne's focus on families required a whole new range of responsibilities for him and his staff.
"We had to have significant others logistics meetings for the first time since I've been the director of football operations," he said.
"I had to sit down on a Zoom with them to make sure we knew how many tickets they need and telling them how it works on road games."
He said they've maintained a group chat since before the season so that everyone can communicate.
The wives and girlfriends all tailgate together in the same lot. They go to dinner together.
"I thoroughly enjoy spending time with these women," Jen Rahne said. "Just like the coaches, we enjoy each other, we make each other laugh. The kids all enjoy each other.
"It just makes it easier for you."
Cory Jackson, a senior defensive end from Jackson, Mississippi, said it makes life easier for the players, too.
"It's a great thing for us to see the families," he said. "The kids and wives get to see what their husbands do at work and we get to spend time with their families.
"We're blessed to be able to have an impact on the lives of their kids."
ODU began this season with six losses in its first seven games. The Monarchs host Charlotte Saturday with a four-game winning streak, and one victory short of bowl eligibility.
Dupuis, who came with Rahne from Penn State, said he doesn't believe it's a coincidence that the team has managed such a dramatic comeback.
He thinks involving families with the program played a major role in allowing the team to remain unified during tough times.
"A lot of teams and coaches talk about family, but coach Rahne has created a family atmosphere that the whole team can feel," he said.
"It's a major reason why we've stuck together and grown so much this season."
Minium worked 39 years at The Virginian-Pilot before coming to ODU to in 2018 to cover athletics for odusports.com Follow him on Twitter @Harry_MiniumODU, Instagram @hbminium1 or email hminium@odu.edu
Minium: Ricky Rahne Insists Families Play a Huge Role for the ODU Football Program
