By Curtis L. Esquibel
"He knew how to motivate your and make you want to play for him,'' said Susanne Miller, 19, a former Columbine High School athlete who now plays college softball at Georgia Tech. "He always knew just the right things to say.''
Sanders, 47, is being hailed as a hero for the effort he made to lead other students to safety during Tuesday's shooting rampage. He never made it out of the school building.
"Here's a man who has given to students for 20 years and his life was taken by two kids who didn't know the meaning of giving,'' said Kerri Held, 20, a former softball and basketball player at Columbine. "They just took.''
Held said Sanders "believed in me when I didn't believe in me. For any player, he would do anything. He was intimidating enough to make you want to improve but he didn't have the heart to yell at anyone.''
Like every coach, Sanders had his own way of conducting practices and preparing his teams for games, former players said Thursday. His greatest talent wasn't in teaching business courses or diagramming X's and O's. It was relating to young people.
"He was concerned not just with players and students, but individually he cared to know how things were going with your personal life and future,'' Held said.
Miller first heard the news of Sanders' being shot while she was in her Atlanta dorm room. She returned home to Littleton as soon as she could.
"He always wanted us to come back and see him,'' Miller said. "During winter break, I came home and watched him coach a basketball practice just because I wanted to see him coach.''
For 25 years, Sanders taught business courses and coached men's and women's athletics at Columbine. Gerry Difford, Columbine's first principal, hired Sanders in 1974. The school opened in 1973.
"He was just a kid from Nebraska back then,'' Sanders said. "He was always willing to take anything on. He didn't try to be the head coach of things necessarily, or be spectacular. He just loved to work with the kids.'
Copyright 1999 The Denver Post. All rights reserved.
Coach, teacher hailed as hero
Special to The Denver Post
April 23 - Coach and teacher Dave Sanders brought out the best in people.
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