THE WEBSTER CITY FOOTBALL TEAM celebrates with head coach Bob Howard in the closing moments of the team’s 2016 state semifinal win at the UNI-Dome. (DFJ file photo by Troy Banning)

WEBSTER CITY — Bob Howard chuckled as he tried to kick his memory into overdrive, and it takes a few moments for him to come up with a response that even he’s not sure is accurate.

When exactly was the last time the Hall of Fame football coach didn’t roam a sideline in the fall?

“Well, it would have had to have been 1963, or 1964, or maybe 1965,” Howard said, noting it goes back to his pre-junior high days. “A long time ago.”

Football and Bob Howard. Bob Howard and football. In the state of Iowa over the last half-century, the two have been as intertwined as peanut butter and jelly.

But after 47 seasons as a head football coach, Howard has decided it’s time to step away, for now anyway. He’s adamant it’s not necessarily a retirement, rather a resignation from the post he’s held at Webster City since 2007.

Does that mean he intends to coach again someday? He’s not ready to go that far. But never say never.

“It probably is retirement, but I’m not closing the door yet,” he said. “But it’s time for me to see if the stress of not coaching is a bigger deal than the stress of coaching.”

Over a 47-year career at Scranton, Sigourney — the program eventually became Sigourney-Keota during his tenure — and WCHS, Howard amassed an overall record of 372-113 with 30 playoff appearances, including 14 during his 17-year run with the Lynx. He won three state titles while at the helm of Sigourney-Keota in 1995, 2001, and 2005, and his 2016 WCHS team reached the Class 3A state championship game for the first time in program history.

The mountain of wins, the championship rings, the Coach of the Year and Hall of Fame plaques, they’re all special and important pieces of Howard’s legacy. They’re not necessarily what he’s most proud of though.

The line of former players that would typically wait outside the WCHS players building following a game in an effort to get a few words with their former coach, those moments mean just as much as any victory.

“When (my career) started, it was all about the numbers,” Howard, who sits fifth on Iowa’s all-time football wins leaderboard, said. “I wanted to be the youngest to do this and the youngest to do that. Well, what difference does any of that make now?

“The thing I’m most proud of at Webster City is I think we elevated the athletic program. I think we elevated everything across the board.”

WCHS athletic director Jess Howard would agree. She was a young coach when Bob Howard was the school’s athletic director, and she learned a great deal — about coaching, about work ethic, and about life — from the man she will now be tasked with replacing.

“I’m struggling with this more than anybody I think,” she said. “It’s hard to put into words the impact he’s made, not only on his football program, but also Webster City athletics in general. And he’s taught a lot of us how to do our jobs the right way by holding us accountable, but by also being that resource we can go to. That plethora of knowledge that he has is there for anybody who is willing to listen.”

It’s no secret the WCHS football program had fallen on hard times in the decade prior to Howard’s arrival in the fall of 2007. The Lynx hadn’t been to the playoffs since 1996 and needed a spark when then Superintendent Mike Sherwood convinced Howard to leave his juggernaut outfit at Sigourney-Keota to rebuild the Lynx empire.

It didn’t take him long.

Following a 3-6 debut campaign in 2007, the Lynx posted an 8-3 mark in 2008 to make the first of 10 consecutive trips to the playoffs. Howard has long credited that 2008 team as being the catalyst to the program’s resurgence.

His 2011 team was one of his most talented groups, led by all-state tailback Keagan Parks and spinback Jonny Davis, who is still the only player in program history to pass and rush for 1,000 yards in a single-season.

Twelve years removed from a stellar prep career and more than 1,000 miles away from his childhood home, Davis — now Dr. Davis of Gloucester City, New Jersey — still credits Howard for helping to shape him into the person he is today.

“Bob Howard has probably had a bigger impact on my life than anybody outside of my family,” Davis, who went on to have a standout collegiate football career at Wayne State University, said. “Everything he trained me for, all of those long hours and hard workouts, prepped me for everything I wanted to do in life — college football, medicine, being a dad now. He’s just a rare human being and should be celebrated.”

Drew Fielder, the spinback on the Lynx 2016 state runner-up team, echoed the words of Davis. And it’s not the games WCHS won, or the trip to the UNI-Dome that Fielder identifies as his most fond memories. It’s the quieter moments around Howard that he’ll treasure forever.

“People from the outside looking in, they have no idea the type of person he is,” said Fielder, who teaches fourth grade in the Norwalk School District. “He cares more for kids than anyone in this world, and you want to play for someone like that. He would go through a brick wall for me, so I’d do anything for him.

“He’s one of the most influential people in my life.”

Howard will forever be synonymous with the single-wing offense, a scheme that gave opponents fits and allowed WCHS to become arguably the top rushing program in its class over his tenure. Since 2010, a span of 14 seasons, the Lynx have rushed for 45,144 yards; that’s 25.65 miles of offense. Also over that time, they eclipsed 3,000 rushing yards nine times and surpassed 4,000 rushing yards three times. They led their class in ground yards three times and finished among the top three in the class seven times.

The Lynx three most prolific rushers of all-time — Jaxon Cherry, Gavin Dinsdale, and Parks — all played under Howard.

“He’s truly the greatest offensive mind in Iowa high school history and one of the greatest coaches in Iowa high school history,” Davis said. “He just creates a culture that embodies winning.”

That’s not just difficult to replace. That’s impossible.

And it isn’t just WCHS that is losing an icon. The entire state is as well.