Century High School names baseball field after former coach Keith Kangas

Jun. 20—ROCHESTER — The legacy of Keith Kangas in the baseball community of Rochester, and particularly at Century High School, will be recognized as the school prepares to name its field after the longtime coach.

There were more than a dozen letters submitted to the school district in support of naming the field after Kangas, who coached for more than 30 years in Rochester and led Century High School to a state championship in 2003.

Kangas died in 2019 at the age of 62.

“Keith set a standard for baseball coaches across the state of Minnesota,” Former John Marshall High School Baseball Coach Terry Heiderscheit wrote in a letter supporting the naming of the field after Kangas. “Beyond wins and titles, Keith dedicated much of his life to developing young athletes in the Rochester community.”

The naming of Century’s field after Kangas is the latest example of several athletic facilities that have been named after influential coaches. Most recently, John Marshall High School named its track after former coach Ron Werner.

Although he was born in Virginia, Minnesota, Kangas’ history in Rochester goes all the way back to when he was still young. He graduated from John Marshall High School in 1974.

After pitching in college at Iowa State University, he moved back to Rochester and began coaching and teaching in the city’s public schools. According to his obituary, he taught physical education at Churchill and Hoover elementary schools, as well as at Mayo and Century high schools.

He started assistant coaching baseball at Mayo High School in 1981 and continued to do so until he became the school’s head coach in 1995. Three years later, he became the head coach at Century High School and was instrumental in building the school’s program.

Five years after he arrived at Century, he led the school’s baseball team to a state championship in 2003.

Beyond his work in the schools, Kangas also coached the American Legion’s team, the Rochester A’s. He made local history for the team by taking them all the way to the U.S. Legion Baseball World Series the same year his Century athletes secured the state championship.

“It was always the pinnacle of baseball in this city if you were selected by Keith to play for the city-wide Rochester A’s,” Jeff Anderson, an assistant baseball coach at Mayo High School, said in a letter supporting the decision to name Century’s field after Kangas.

Kangas retired from coaching the Rochester A’s in 2010. He continued coaching at Century until he retired in 2013.

Kangas’ legacy is rooted not just in his winning record as a coach, but in the time he poured into his athletes and the field that now bears his name.

The letters submitted in support of naming Century’s field after Kangas speak about the countless hours he spent fundraising for the facility’s dugouts, scoreboard, press box and other features.

The letters speak of the care he put into the maintenance of the field, and how he would spend time mowing, trimming and grooming the field — his “office,” as one letter writer described it.

He would get the field ready in the spring. And then later in the year, he would organize the athletes to help prepare the field for winter.

Of those who wrote letters supporting the nomination to name Century’s field after Kangas, multiple either indicated or said outright that he was responsible for building the school’s baseball program from the ground up into what it is today.

But ultimately, his legacy goes beyond that of one school. For many, Kangas is remembered as a baseball legacy for the whole of Rochester.

“I have seen firsthand that Keith’s impacts spans generations — from the players of the 1980s to those of the 2010s,” one of Kangas’ former athletes, Nicholas Merges, wrote in support of the decision. “Across all these eras, he is universally respected for what he did for Century High School, Rochester Legion Baseball, and the city of Rochester as a whole.”