Jack Hartman (October 7, 1925 – November 6, 1998) was an American gridiron football player and

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

coach. Hartman played

and football collegiately at

Oklahoma State University Oklahoma (; Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a state in the South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the north, Missouri on the northeast, Arkansas on the east, New ...

with his basketball tutelage under famed coach

Henry Iba Henry Payne Iba (; August 6, 1904 – January 15, 1993) was an American basketball coach and college athletics administrator. He served as the head basketball coach at Northwest Missouri State Teacher's College, now known as Northwest Missouri St ...

. After college, he played

quarterback The quarterback (commonly abbreviated "QB"), colloquially known as the "signal caller", is a position in gridiron football. Quarterbacks are members of the offensive platoon and mostly line up directly behind the offensive line. In modern Ame ...

in the CFL before becoming a basketball coach. After leading the Coffeyville (Kansas) Junior College basketball team to the NJCAA National Championship with a 32–0 season in 1962, he took his high-octane offense to

Southern Illinois University Southern Illinois University is a system of public universities in the southern region of the U.S. state of Illinois. Its headquarters is in Carbondale, Illinois. Board of trustees The university is governed by the nine member SIU Board of Tr ...

, replacing the successful Harry Gallatin, who had taken the head coaching job with the

St. Louis Hawks The Atlanta Hawks are an American professional basketball team based in Atlanta. The Hawks compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Southeast Division. The team plays its home games at ...

. In 1967, passing up the NCAA Division II tournament after two successive second-place finishes, Hartman's Salukis won the NIT Championship, which was much more highly regarded then than it is today. He led Southern Illinois University into Division I before taking over at Kansas State when

Cotton Fitzsimmons Lowell Gibbs "Cotton" Fitzsimmons (October 7, 1931 – July 24, 2004) was an American college and NBA basketball coach. A native of Bowling Green, Missouri, he attended and played basketball at Hannibal-LaGrange Junior College in Hannibal, M ...

left to coach in the NBA. Hartman spent 16 seasons as head coach at Kansas State University, where he won 294 games and finished in first or second place in the Big Eight Conference in 10 of those 16 seasons. After his retirement, he worked local television color commentary for Kansas State games, and his former player and assistant coach

Lon Kruger Lonnie Duane Kruger (born August 19, 1952) is a retired American college and professional basketball coach who was most recently the men's basketball head coach of the University of Oklahoma. Kruger played college basketball for Kansas State Uni ...

took over as head coach at Kansas State. Hartman is credited for introducing a unique two-tone uniform for Kansas State to wear during away games – lavender tops and purple shorts, which the Wildcats used from 1973–1982. During that stretch, KSU posted a record of 186–81 (.697), appeared in five NCAA Tournaments, and won the 1977 and 1980 Big Eight postseason tournaments. Lavender jerseys have since been associated with success at Kansas State, and the school has brought back lavender jerseys on certain occasions as a throwback uniform. In 1996, when Kansas State fired its women's coach for NCAA violations, Hartman came out of retirement to coach the team for its last seven games, winning three. Coach Hartman was inducted into the Southern Illinois University Hall of Fame in 1986, Kansas State University Hall of Fame in 1990, State of Kansas Sports Hall of Fame in 1990, and National Junior College Hall of Fame in 1991. Hartman died in 1998. He has a street near

Bramlage Coliseum Fred Bramlage Coliseum is a multi-purpose arena in Manhattan, Kansas with an official capacity of 11,654. It is the home to the K-State Men's and Women's basketball teams and serves as an alternative venue for K-State Women's Volleyball. The faci ...

named "Jack Hartman Drive" after him. His wife, Pat, lived in

Manhattan, Kansas Manhattan is a city and county seat of Riley County, Kansas, United States, although the city extends into Pottawatomie County. It is located in northeastern Kansas at the junction of the Kansas River and Big Blue River. As of the 2020 c ...

until her death in 2020. His daughter, Jackie, also lives in Manhattan and served as the Chief of Staff for the President of Kansas State University.Jackie Hartman Bio
/ref> Kruger Hartman

Head coaching record

Men's college basketball

*1976–77 record reflects one win by forfeit over Minnesota.

Women's college basketball

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hartman, Jack 1925 births 1998 deaths American men's basketball players American women's basketball coaches American football quarterbacks American players of Canadian football Basketball coaches from Oklahoma Basketball players from Oklahoma Canadian football quarterbacks College men's basketball head coaches in the United States Junior college men's basketball coaches in the United States Kansas State Wildcats men's basketball coaches Kansas State Wildcats women's basketball coaches Oklahoma State Cowboys basketball players Oklahoma State Cowboys football players People from Dewey, Oklahoma Players of American football from Oklahoma Saskatchewan Roughriders players Southern Illinois Salukis men's basketball coaches