Football Coach Trying To Beat Cancer In Final Year Before Retirement

Obviously, this is not a game.

This is real life.

Libertyville High football coach Randy Kuceyeski isn’t trying to beat the coach of the team on the other side of the field.

He’s trying to beat cancer.

And just as his Wildcat football teams have done 128 times in his 17 years as head grid coach, expect him to win again.

Number 129!

It was in May that the popular coach realized something might be wrong.

“I noticed my right lymph node was swollen, so I went to my doctors. It was biopsied and it came back positive,” he said.

Late last month, Coach K. began chemotherapy for Squamos-cell carcinoma. It’s one of the most common cancers and can occur in the skin, mouth, throat, and lungs, among other places. While more common in smokers or users of chewing tobacco, Coach Kuceyeski is neither.

Last week, he was running his annual youth football camp for about 70 players at Butler Lake Park in Libertyville.

While at camp, he carried around his chemo “fanny pack” to finish out the first round of treatment.

After six weeks of chemotherapy, he will begin five-day radiation and chemotherapy treatments scheduled for Sunday nights through Friday afternoons at the University of Chicago Hospital, followed by nine days of recovery time at home.

“My goal was to make it all three days of camp,” he said.

He also has a goal for his final Libertyville High football team.

He’s retiring at the end of the coming school year, and would love to go out with a 14th appearance in the IHSA playoffs. He coached the Wildcats to a Class 7A state championship in 2004 and a state runner-up finish in 2003.

“This was going to be my last year anyway,” the coach said. “Unfortunately, this put a curve in my retirement plan. It’s not the activity level I would have liked for my final season, but some things are out of your control.”

Kuceyeski likes his team’s chances for 2011.

“We’re going to have some nice players,” he said, mentioning, among others, 6-foot-5 linebacker Luke Mathewson, Mike Parker, Steve Skul (sounds like “school”), and defensive back A.J. Schmidt.

“(Summer high-school) camp starts (Tuesday) and runs to the 28th, then we’re off for 10 days, so I’ll be checking into the hospital right around the time we’re finishing camp up.”

As for delegating coaching responsibilities when he’s not able to be around, the coach said there will be no problems in that regard.

“Every single guy on the staff is going to pick up some extra work,” said Kuceyeski. “We’ve been together so long it’s almost automatic for us anyway. They’re doing a great job. Everyone realizes the circumstances, and we’re going to try to make the best of it.”

The best of it, in this case, being Coach K. being declared cancer-free the same day as the Wildcat football team wins a second- or third-round playoff game.