Schuckman: Path to Hawkins’ return as QU men’s basketball coach began with meal at Portillo’s

QUINCY — Steve Hawkins isn’t shy about his appreciation for quality cuisine.

He is loyal to the restaurants he finds reliable and appetizing.

So it came as no surprise Wednesday morning, hours before he was to be introduced as the new Quincy University men’s basketball coach, Hawkins ate breakfast at the Coach House, a longstanding establishment at the corner of 24th and Broadway which was one of his favorites during his first stint as the Hawks’ head coach.

“I took a picture of the menu and sent it to my former players,” Hawkins said.

He’s also been known to describe locales or offer directions based on eateries.

“So somebody asked me when I left and went to Kalamazoo how big it was,” said Hawkins, who coached at Quincy from 1991-2000 before moving on to Western Michigan University. “And I’m like, ‘We’re a three Applebee’s city. We have multiple McDonald’s, multiple Taco Bells. We do have an Outback.’

“See, I do everything by food.”

It only made sense then for Hawkins and Quincy University athletic director Josh Rabe to share a dine-in experience while discussing the Hawks’ coaching vacancy and determining if there was mutual interest in moving forward

Eleven days after he fired Ryan Hellenthal as Quincy’s coach and proceeded to be inundated with inquiries about the job from near and far, Rabe drove four-plus hours north to Chicago and Hawkins drove 2 ½ hours south to meet in the middle for their initial face-to-face conversation about the job.

Prior to that, Rabe had multiple former QU players and some of Hawkins’ associates reach out to suggest this was the route to take.

“So I called him and said, ‘Do you have interest?’ Rabe said. “He responded, ‘Yes.’”

And off they went to meet at Portillo’s, a Windy City staple known for its Italian beef sandwiches, Chicago-style hot dogs and chocolate cake shakes.

Sure enough, they enjoyed the food as much as they did the conversation.

“We could have eaten twice at Portillos as long as we were there,” Hawkins said.

The conversation flowed, and when they got into some intricate details about the current state of the program, the potential for change and the vision for upgrading facilities, pay scales and rosters, both parties discovered they had similar visions.

“I think it was important before I heard him out that I laid out my vision for the program, what it should be, what it should stand for, what it should look like,” Rabe said. “After that, he didn’t do much explaining. He was like, ‘I agree.’ And we went from there.”

Rabe’s approach impressed Hawkins, who has worked under a variety of athletic directors.

“I liked everything,” Hawkins said. “He’s a no-nonsense guy. It really, really … I can’t tell you how much it helps having a coach in that position. As he started to lay out what his vision was and why it was important to him, I started to get excited. 

“I started to feel the juices jangling a bit. I was kind of excited about it. The more that we talked the more we found out it was going to be a good fit.”

Hawkins’ familiarity with the community and those closely involved with the program enabled him to have some insider knowledge. He also was well-versed on where the school stood financially and strategically, having been contacted about the athletic director position when it opened 16 months ago.

“I had a conversation with (QU President Dr. Brian McGee), and as much as I wanted to be back in Quincy and as much as that was attractive to me, he made the right decision,” Hawkins said. “He would have been trying to jam a square peg into a round hole with me. I’m a coach at heart and I still have a lot of it in me.

“The admin side certainly had my interest, but I don’t know what I’m doing. I turn in receipts. I don’t handle them. That was the right thing for everyone.”

The idea Hawkins was intrigued by returning to Quincy as an administrator made it logical then to reach out to him about the basketball job.

“I remember saying this when I left the first time and the quote appeared in the newspaper and it was ‘I came here a Californian and I’m leaving a Quincyan,’” Hawkins said. “It was the sense of community and all the things that make this area special. That’s why I’ve come back so many times.

“I never felt disconnected. I probably have as many friends on Facebook or Twitter followers from this area as I do anywhere else.”

His wife doesn’t. She was raised in the greater Kalamazoo area and has made living in Michigan her life.

So would she get on board with the idea of moving to Quincy?

Rabe knew that would be a challenge.

“A big deal in this was meeting his family,” said Rabe, who had Hawkins come to Quincy for a formal interview on March 4. “If his wife wasn’t happy, this was going to be a bad fit. Once I kind of felt her out and she was like, ‘This is good, this is good for us,’ then it was OK this will work. It was a good visit.”

The connection made between Hawkins’ two daughters — Emily and Alyssa — and Rabe’s daughter, Paige, during the campus visit and interview mattered, too.

“They hit it off,” Hawkins said. “They ran crazy and had a blast.”

Still, his wife’s comfortability was going to determine the next move.

“It was more about, ‘Could she see a life here?’” Hawkins said.

When Kelly Hawkins was told there was a Target coming to town, the deal was done.

“That was the selling point for my wife,” Hawkins said with a chuckle.

Still uprooting his family and moving to a town he loves but they will have to grow to love wasn’t a cut-and-dry decision.

“The most difficult decision of my life was coming here, but it wasn’t as a coach,” Hawkins said. “That was not the hard part. It was as a husband and a father. That was the hardest part about making this decision. Once they got on board and they became excited about it, it was much easier for me to get excited about it again.”

It also convinced Rabe this was going to work.

“There was no road map for how we ended up here,” Rabe said. “Where we’re at right now, we got it right. We got the hire right here.”

And they can go back to Portillo’s, knowing it’s a great place to eat on the road and the site where the next chapter of Quincy University basketball began.