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Tom Allen: Leading Through Biblical Principles

The Indiana Hoosiers University football team is having their best season in decades. The Hoosiers have been ranked in the top 10 for the first time since 1967. The success of the season is largely due to their enthusiastic head coach, Tom Allen. His enthusiasm has cost him at times. Recently, in a win over Michigan, Allen congratulated defensive player Devon Matthews by jumping on his back as he came off the field. It resulted in a gash on Allen’s cheek. At other times in his career as a coach, he has suffered bruises, a black eye, and once had his two front teeth knocked out when he went face to face with a player who still had his helmet on.

Coach Allen loves his players. Relationships mean everything to him. I had the chance to interview the coach soon after he became the head coach in 2016, and he talked about that philosophy. “We care about them way more as a person than as a football player.” All over the Indiana locker room is the word LEO, which means “love everyone.”

Tom Allen comes from humble roots and has hit every rung on the ladder on the way to his position as the head coach of a Big 10 school. He played for his dad at New Castle high school in Indiana, and rather than being highly recruited he went to tiny Maranatha Baptist College in Wisconsin, where he played football, wrestled, and excelled in the shot put. He went there because his brother had gone there. Upon graduation in 1992, he became assistant coach, then head coach at Temple Heights Christian School in Tampa, Florida. That began a succession of coaching stops at various high schools including Marion, Indiana, and Ben Davis outside of Indianapolis.

In 2007, he got his first college coaching assignment at Wabash College in Crawfordsville, IN. Then came five more moves, before he was hired as defensive coordinator for Indiana University in 2016. He said he and his family once lived in seven states in ten years. In the fall of 2016, he was hired as Indiana University head coach when former head coach Kevin Wilson was fired at the end of the regular season. Allen’s first game as head coach came quickly as he prepared the Hoosiers to play Utah in the Foster Farms Bowl in California, where they were defeated. The Hoosiers have been gradually more successful since leading up to their 4-0 start this year.

Through it all, Allen’s Christian leadership has shined through. “Coaching is based on Biblical principles,” he told me. ” I try to dive into (his players) lives and help them become the man God has created them to be. I want them to know about the relationship I have with Christ and that it is important to me. I am very open about what I believe, and I challenge them on what they believe.”

Allen grew up in a Christian home in New Castle. He became a believer when his mom led him to the Lord when he was eight years old. His whole family was later baptized together. Today, no matter what happens in the win/lost column, Allen wants everyone to know that Christ is first in his life.

At the end of the interview, I asked him for a favorite verse in the Bible, and he quickly recited Matthew 6:33, which reads, “But seek first His kingdom, and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.”

So the next time you see Tom Allen running up and down the sidelines or hugging a player, realize it’s not just the love of the game or his players, but the love of Jesus that comes from the heart.

Listen to Tom Rust’s recent interview with Coach Allen here.