by Tim Froberg
Fall Means Football for Neenah Coach and Educator
Merge atoms and molecules with X’s and O’s.
What you get is a day in the busy life of Steve Jung.
Football and chemistry might seem like an odd combination, but they have served Jung well.
Jung teaches the subject in high school and preaches another form of it – team chemistry – once he steps onto the football field.
Coach Jung is best known for the latter. He has coached prep football across Wisconsin for two-and-half decades and has a knack for turning long-struggling programs into winning ones.
Take his impressive work at Neenah High School. Prior to Jung’s arrival as head coach in 2013, the Rockets were a sleeping giant: a big school that had been bullied on the gridiron with a 7-38 record and no playoff appearances in the previous five years.
It was then that Jung the chemist went to work and found a winning formula. Gradually, he transformed the lightweight program into an area power. The Rockets have posted a 29-9 record (entering October) for the past three years, with two Level 3 playoff appearances and a Level 2 playoff game.
It’s a chemical explosion the Neenah sports community has welcomed. And it’s not the first time Jung has resurrected a snoozing football program. He did similar work earlier throughout his prep coaching career at Waukesha North and Wausau East.
A standout player himself at Neenah, Coach Jung went on to Lawrence University where he landed Division 3 all-American honors as a defensive back in 1989, and now, his life is full-throttle football in the fall. When he’s not coaching the game on Friday nights, Jung and his wife, Wendy, can usually be found in the bleachers at a distant college watching one of their four sons play.
“Football to me is the greatest team sport,” praises Jung. “There are so many components that need to come together to have success.”
THE WINNING TOUCH
Jung (pronounced ‘Young’) has made those components come together as a football coach for the past 25 years, including more than 15 as a varsity coach and the last 12 at his alma mater. He almost didn’t take the Neenah job after revitalizing an underachieving Wausau East program in his two seasons (2011-2012) as the Lumberjacks’ head coach.
“Neenah wasn’t very good at the time, and I had just taken over a program at Wausau East that was kind of similar, but had started to turn things around,” says Jung, a 1986 Neenah graduate where he excelled in football and track and field. “I thought, ‘Gosh, do I want to go backwards?’ I really struggled with that decision.”
With that, Steve sought advice from John Mielke: the highly successful boys’ basketball coach and teacher at Appleton East. Jung had previously coached football and taught chemistry at East from 2000-2010 where he had become friends with Mielke.
“I called John, and he said, ‘Steve don’t do it, because I don’t want to play basketball against your four boys for the next 10 years,’” shares Jung with a laugh.
Mielke, of course, was only joking.
“John then told me, ‘Steve, you’ve got to do it. I moved from Antigo to Appleton, and it was the best decision I’ve ever made. I had a great thing going in Antigo, but coming home, there’s nothing better. The job in Neenah may never open again where it coordinates with your schedule. You will regret it for the rest of your life if you don’t take it.’”
So just how did Coach Jung breathe life into three wheezing football programs?
“First of all, the kids have to know that you care about them,” he explains. “Another thing is you must put the time in – and it’s a grind. Once the season starts, it’s non-stop football – up at 4:30 every morning and going to bed at 10:30 every night.”
“You also need a great staff. Bring in people that are good and that you trust. Then let them do their jobs and believe in the process.”
RELATIONSHIPS MATTER THE MOST
Despite the long hours and low pay involved, Jung still finds coaching prep football to be a blast. Talk to him about coaching and it’s hard for him to get through a sentence without using the word ‘fun’ at least once.
“It’s super fun,” Jung says. “It’s a big-time commitment – which is why fewer people are getting into coaching – and there is a lot of stress that comes with the role. But there are so many positives. If you do it right and hire the right coaches, it makes a big difference.”
The Friday night Ws are of course rewarding and validate that he’s doing a good job, but the relationships made with his players and coaching staff are what Jung treasures the most.
“The relationships you build with your kids, your coaches and your whole football family is special,” Jung shares. “Getting a win is awesome because you get to share all that emotion with your kids and coaches.”
“There are so many enjoyable things involved in being a coach. Simply hanging out with the kids and all the energy they have; watching them grow.”
“I mean, you get to watch a kid change into a man. You get to share the highs and lows with them and all the funny moments in between.”
Jung didn’t become an accomplished coach overnight. He leaned on friends who were fellow coaches to help him through the tough spots.
“You need people like Dave Hinkins (long-time Xavier head coach) and Paul Nievinski (veteran Mosinee coach) who you can call for advice to help you through trials,” he explains. “I’ve been blessed with a number of guys that helped me out a lot. Steve Jones at Kimberly was very helpful to me when I first got to Neenah.”
As much as football consumes his life, Jung can’t be defined as just a coach. He’s been a full-time high school science teacher for years at Waukesha North, Appleton East, Wausau East and Neenah, and holds a degree in chemistry from Lawrence.
“Kids bring energy,” claims Jung. “You find out that a lot of kids in the classroom are like our football players. They enjoy learning and are curious about a lot of stuff. It makes for a fun environment.”
CHANGING PATHS
Jung never planned to become a football coach.
“The plan initially was to go into paper chemistry,” Steve reminisces. “My girlfriend at the time who is now my wife (Wendy Hill, a pediatrician for Theda Care) was going to medical school at U-W (Wisconsin). I followed her down there and got a job doing research in entomology. I was a lab technician for three years, but I missed sports and realized I wanted to be a high school teacher and coach.”
Jung returned to Lawrence where he received his teaching certificate and joined the Vikings coaching staff. He accepted a teaching and coaching job at Waukesha North in 1996 when Wendy began her residency at the Medical College of Wisconsin in the Milwaukee area. Four years later, Steve and Wendy moved back to the Fox Cities for a teaching and coaching job at Appleton East. The Wausau East and Neenah jobs followed.
“Waukesha North was my first opportunity to be a high school coach and teacher, and I was so excited about getting that job. I can’t even remember the details of the day,” Jung tells us. “I can’t even remember the time of the day they called to offer me it.”
MY FOUR SONS
Once the thrill – or sting – of a Friday night game is over, Coach Jung shifts into dad mode and often hits the road with Wendy to watch his sons play college football. Matt – the third oldest of the four boys – is a ball-hawking junior safety for the Wisconsin Badgers after transferring from Bethel College where he was a division 3 first-team all-American.
Meanwhile, Luke, the youngest of the Jungs, is a freshman defensive back at the University of Minnesota-Duluth.
Matt and Luke are following in the path of Steve along with their two older brothers, Joe and Sam, who both played four years of college football. Joe was a division 3 first-team all-American defensive back at St. Norbert College while Sam was a starting free safety at Division 1-AA North Dakota State.
Steve and Wendy traveled to many of Joe and Sam’s games – often enduring a 10-hour drive to Fargo that usually started at 3 a.m. – just hours after the finish of one of Steve’s Neenah games.
All four of the Jung boys were also heavily involved in basketball. Steve was excited that his sons gravitated towards athletics, but never pushed them into sports.
“It was the other way around,” teases Joe Jung, who works in medical software for Epic Systems in Madison. “We were always like, ‘Dad, let’s go play basketball. Dad, can you throw the football to us?’ He would play basketball in the driveway with us and throw footballs to us for hours.”
“The fact that we all played college football, I think it was just in the bloodlines to be honest,” Joe goes on to say. “We were always playing ball, beating each other up in the front yard. We loved it. I have been told that my first word was actually ‘ball.”
Jung is 57 and isn’t sure when he will step away from coaching. But until that day arrives, he’s going to enjoy every single moment of coaching.
“Even when we start the day lifting before school, I enjoy that time in the weight room,” Jung said. “It’s a fun part of my day because the kids and coaches bring energy. Because of that, all that hard work turns into fun work.”
This article was originally published in the October 2025 issue of Appleton Monthly Magazine.
