March 30, 2025 • 46 mins
Hunter Price, former head coach at Bigfoot High School and Youth Pastor at Springfield Bible Church
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Faith in the Zone on Fox Sports nine
twenty in your iHeart Radio app. Thanks for joining us.
I'm Mike mcgimmerrein Flye Sold this week. Pastor Ken Keltner
from Brookside Baptist Church will be back in studio to
me next week, and I'm coming from live from the
Donovan and Jorganson Heating and Coolian Studios. Any issues you
have with your HVAC system, you'd have to turn your
(00:22):
air conditioner on soon. Any issues you have go to
Donovan Jorgensen dot com. So I was excited until about
I don't know, a day ago of doing this this interview.
You know, I did a bunch of work on Hunter Price.
He got coach at basketball here in the state of
Wisconsin's now a youth pastor down in Illinois. And the
(00:44):
more I dug on the Hunter Price once I found
out who was the head basketball coach at Bigfoot, and
Bigfoot beat my boys from Greendale Martin Luther after I
had retired in a regional final. I believe, and I
know exactly where I was. Look, I don't know my
nieces and nephews' names, but I know exactly where I
(01:04):
was when the kid from Bigfoot hit a shot at
the buzzer to beat my boys at Greendale Martin Luther.
I was in the parking lot of Catholic Memorial scouting
a game, and I had to run out to listen
to the last three and a half minutes of the
Bigfoot Greendale Martin Luther game. And I've been mad at
Bigfoot ever since. And now I find out that my
(01:25):
special guest today was the head basketball coach at Bigfoot
for that game. All Right, I still decided to have
a hunter come on, hey, coach, Hi, how you been?
And I know exactly where I was the moment that
kid hit the three, and I put my head down
and I just felt bad for my good friend, coach
(01:47):
Paul Wallers s time.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
That was a good win for the boys from Bigfoot.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
Yeah, I'm still thankful to be here, Mike, and I
just learned to say, I'm appreciative of what you guys
are doing using this platform to display Christ and who
he is and how he works in everyone's lives. As
someone trying to get into this space doing podcasting on
sports and faith and things like that, I look up
to you guys and what you're doing. I found your podcast.
(02:13):
I've listened. You guys do such an amazing job. I'm
super grateful you wanted to have me on. With that said,
I am not sorry about how that as it is
one of the best moments of my life. And it's
funny how sports works, right at the best moment of
someone's life is the worst moment of someone else's And
what a crazy paradigm that is a sports And I
(02:36):
will say Paul is the coach of Martin Luther, and
I respect him so much and how he's outspoken about
his face and how he coaches. And the one thing
I feel bad about was him losing in that way
and that game. And I'll tell you what too. I
texted him a few days after that game. I said,
I want to apologize. I didn't come over right away
and say a good game. And he was so gracious.
(02:58):
He was like, dude, won a regional title and a
buzzer beater. I did not expect you to just walk
over and then you know, so I was super grateful
for the way he handled it as well well.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
And I sent you a video this morning.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
And after we won that state championship again, that was
my last game and I knew that that was my
last season coach, and and I was lucky enough that
was the third one I won with Paul, and I
won some with the Christian schools and and but that
last one is really special to me because it was
it was a four year journey to get Greendale Martin
(03:32):
Luther to where we thought that they could be, and
to to to be a part of that staff and
and and hang out with coach Wallersheim on a daily basis,
and we still talk a ton. We we talk sometimes,
you know, ten times a week, just checking in what's
going on?
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Can you can you? Can you do?
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Can you run out and scout a game for me?
Real quick? I go, yeah, one hundred percent. Where do
you need me? We're seeing Saint Catherine's that live in
p Water. You give me something closer, you know, that
kind of stuff. And I can tell you that we
we we watched some film together as he was preparing
to play Bigfoot, and he, you know, we both thought
(04:13):
that this was gonna be a really good game, and
we thought your team was really well coached and ran
good stuff.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
And we we found a couple.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Of things we thought we could we could get away with, right,
some things that he thought he could get done and
the game was everything he thought except for that last
shot going in. And I talked to him, Well, they
weren't halfway back to Greendale, Martin Luther when he called
me and he said, you know what happened? I said,
(04:40):
listen to the last three and a half minutes. He said, man,
we we we had a chance. We we You know,
I'm gonna go watch the film, but I think we
had a chance to beat and they're a really good
team and it wouldn't surprise me. And he said this,
it wouldn't surprise me to see them up in Madison.
So that that tells you everything he thought about you
in that program. Hey, Hunch, as we talk the the
(05:02):
when you talked about doing some of this stuff in
that podcast, and I've listened to a lot of your stuff.
It's really good V three content at V three content,
and I would I would really recommend guys.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
It's a it's.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
A really good if you like high school sports, if
you like high school basketball. What what what they're talking
about on that podcast was really needed. You know, I
feel like we're the only ones I do that high
school basketball show every Saturday morning here on Fox Sports
nine twenty from nine am to eleven o'clock eleven am
(05:36):
every Saturday morning.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
And it used to be a lot of us a
few years ago.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
There are a lot of people doing some stuff and
there's not so much anymore, especially stuff like this, And Hunter,
talk to me a little bit before I get into
coaching and what you're doing now, talk to me about
why you started V three content and and tell me
a little bit about you know how that's going.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Thanks for letting me share about this, because it's something
I'm super passionate about. And there's a couple of reasons
why I got into it. Number One, I just loved
creating content. As a college student, I created the sports
Debate page on Facebook and it blew up and tons
of people would argue sports every day. And then at
my school, that school I was a teacher at, I
(06:19):
started the first ever sports news club and we'd report
on the sports news every week and over covid for
a bit of therapy. I wrote a book on coaching
and just wanted to get all my thoughts out and
things like that. And I just love creating things. I
love sports, so that's always been in my blood. And
then I stepped down from coaching, there's this void, right,
(06:39):
So you spent your whole life in this sport, you
spent your whole life competing and having that outlet, and
when you step down from that, that's hard to replace.
So I knew there's something I needed to do in
that to fill that void for me. So I didn't
become lazy or content or pass or have regrets about
(07:01):
life and things like that. So we're driving home from
Thanksgiving up the Chicago area and I'm in the car
with my wife and I said, Natalie, this is going
to sound so crazy, and she's like, what's going on
because she's heard some crazy ideas. And I was like,
I really think I should start a podcast. I've been
thinking about it in my mind. I've been jotting it
out since probably last summer, but I've been too embarrassed
(07:23):
to tell anyone because I don't want people to go
all this guy also is starting a podcast, or another
person who thinks he's got something to say. So that
was kind of in my mind, and I told my
wife is kind of a litmus test, and immediately Mike,
she was like, do it. You need to do it.
You have a story to tell and so it was
(07:43):
hitting the ground running after that. I've been blessed by
the Lord to have tons of connections in the coaching industry,
so right away I had tons of friends reach out
Jay binish Kin Walkin. The list goes on and on
about just people that were I would love to come
on and help you out and be a guest, and
I was just so blessed by that. So I've got
that going and people are tuning in and it's been
(08:05):
going well and fun, and I'm sitting here, I'm going
I need to share christ as well, because that would
be quite unfortunate to have this platform and not share
about the reason I'm here, the reason I'm even alive,
the reason I have life to this day. So I
talked to my colleague, one of the lead pastors at
my church, Johnny Standard, who played college basketball Wheaton, one
(08:28):
of the most amazing man I've ever met in my life,
one of the most vible, smart guys I've ever met
in my life. And I was like, dude, do you
want to do a Christian leadership type of podcast. I
don't have a huge vision right now, but I know
it's needed and I can merge these with sports fans
who might be interested in that might lead some people
(08:48):
to the Lord. And he took me up on it
right away. And you know, we're learning still. You know,
I listened to your guys's Mike and I'm like, these
guys are the professionals, fully smokes. We've got a long
way to go, spars quality and entertainment and all that stuff.
But that's how I got to it is I want
to share my passion of sports, my passion of Christ
with other people, and if I can find a platform
(09:10):
to do that, I'm going.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
To do it. Our special guest for the entire hour,
and I'm not mad at him anymore. He is Hunter
Price and you can follow him on Twitter at coach
h Price. One word at coach h Price and you can.
I would highly recommend V three content. And that's the
name of it, correct.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
It's so Voice Vision Victory is on Spotify, Apple, podcast,
and YouTube. The x account formerly known as Twitter is
at V three content, but on Spotify, Apple and YouTube
it's Voice Vision Victory. And those are the three things
that I want to really talk about in every single podcast.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
You know, I love that, and I wish my co host,
I wish pastor Ken was here the head pastor at
Brookside Baptist Church. He his father was a a pastor,
He was a youth pastor for a long time, head
head pastor at Brookside, and.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
We don't have a youth pastor.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
So he now is he's actually at a town in
New York with with uh with some some youth from
our our church, and he is he is doing this
dual role until he until we can find a youth
pastor to come serve at Brookside Baptist.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
And he's like, look, I'm sixty seven years old.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
And I'm too old to do this youth pastor stuff.
And so what I wish he was in studio with me, Hunter,
because you guys would have a lot to talk about. Hey,
so you coached at Parker Jamesville Parker and coached at Bigfoot.
Did you play?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Go ahead?
Speaker 3 (10:40):
It was okay, did you?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
And where did you play? Where'd you go to high school?
Speaker 3 (10:47):
I'm from southern Illinois, a town called Harrisburg, very very
good sports town, but at the very bottom of Illinois
by the Kentucky border.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
Okay, so you're what would that make you an Illin
NOI fan? In college basketball, Kentucky fan.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
What does that make you, dude?
Speaker 3 (11:04):
It's so messy. There's no pro sports teams near. The
Illinois scene is disappointing at best. So you kind of
grew up a free agent. So I grew up a
massive Green Bay Packers fan. Actually had a boy, and
that's all I cared about as a kid. I remember
turning on Monday night football watching Brett Barr run around,
(11:24):
and I was like, I want to for that guy.
So I have not missed a Packers game in probably
twenty years.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Yeah, I'm back liking you again. Look at that, See
how that? See how that that happens? And did you
So you played high school ball? Did you play in college?
Speaker 3 (11:41):
No? I coached through college. I I coached a couple
of high schools as an assistant, and then at the
University of Illinois Springfield, I was a student manager and
just kind of did all the dirty work for the
team and learned as much as I could.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Well, I I love the U.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
When when you decided to leave Bigfoot, I read that
that what you had written out, and you know where
you said, Look, not many schools willing to take into
twenty six year old kid with big dreams take over
their basketball program.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
But you did, Bigfoot.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
You saw the potential of me and allowed me to
find myself in developing the man that I am. After
five years, decided to step down. The decision to step
down from Bigfoot coach was what was? What was in
that decision?
Speaker 3 (12:26):
You know all those forensic shows and they're searching for
a killer and they've got you know, ropes going everywhere
else you hookcorkboard.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Yeah, it's kind.
Speaker 3 (12:34):
Of one of those things, man, where you know, I
guess the easiest way to chalk it up to be
the sovereign plan of God. It's not my own plan,
and just kind of him working. There was a lot
of just little things. I honestly, I lost the passion
for teaching. It really wasn't what it used to be.
And I owe it to kids to have a passion
(12:55):
and love what I'm doing. They don't deserve someone who's
not absolutely on fire what for for that thing? And
coaching wise, there's there's a lot of things. And I
love the kids so much. I talked to them regularly
to this day in group texts and phone calls and
all that stuff. But I came to a point where
I knew I either needed to move careers or probably
(13:19):
move schools because uh, I guess the best way to
put it was was the computing community was never fully
bought into basketball, Like we couldn't fill youth teams. I
couldn't find youth coaches and things like that. And it's
not to asparge them at all. I think everyone's got there.
They're good and they're bad. And I knew at some
point I would have to figure that out or be
(13:39):
content in my situation, right, Like, if you're not content
in your situation, that's not good for anyone. So there
was a lot of things kind of happening, and I felt,
Lord say, you need to go into ministry, and I
would have never picked that for myself, to be honest
with you, even a year away from that, and someone
said you'd be a youth pastor and be like, no,
no chance, you know. So that was by just clearly
(14:00):
by the Lord alone pushing me into that. And then
a job popped up at a church across the street
from my in laws in Springfield, Illinois, and I was like, well,
I think the Lord wanted me to take this. It
seems pretty obvious. So there's a lot of little things.
I don't regret my time all there. I thought it
was an amazing experience. And like you, like you mentioned,
(14:23):
not a whole lot of schools want to hire a
twenty six year old to lead their program and be
a main leader in their school. Some I'm forever grateful
for them for allowing me to do that hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
And what a great combination coach did to be to
be a coach of youth and then to be a
youth pastor. Like I just think that if you're coaching,
especially basketball has become a twelve month sport now, and
you're trying to lead young men to be you know,
better teammates and a better player and better kid and
(14:56):
better student, and then you go and become a youth pastor,
I think there's some synergy to that, correct.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
There absolutely is. One of the funniest things is when
I told people I was making a change, Remember when
they were shocked, But almost everyone goes, well, you know,
parents are really hard and the kids are hard to
deal with nowadays. I kind of stared at them, like, oh,
I have a teacher that was forty hours a week.
You know, this will be nothing compared to what teachers
are going through right now. So I thought that was
(15:24):
pretty funny.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Yeah, that that is. Hey, let's get to a break.
This is uh.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
I can't recommend go to this podcast Voice Vision Victory,
Voice Vision Victory and it's V three content, but voice
if you google Voice Vision Victory, if you google my
special guest, he is Hunter Price, google his name and
you'll be able to find this.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
And if you enjoyed high.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
School athletics, and it's not just high school athletics, it
really is. You know, what they're trying to do is
they're talking about a lot of different on this podcast.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
Now.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
They we've high school athletics and coaching, and I like
some of that stuff.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
What they do.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
I love listening to coaches breakdown different should we you know,
maybe we should have ran. Pastor Kellys wanted me when
I coached his boys. In fact, Hunter Pastor Ken's kids,
I coached at Calvary Baptist in Milwaukee along with my son,
and he always wanted me to run that Syracuse two
three and.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
My biggest kid was six two. My forwards were like.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Six one and five ten, And I'm like, Pastor, they
really they got six nine forwards and wings out there
that's why they can run that. And he's like, no,
you got to play zone? Were you a man de
Mander zone guy?
Speaker 3 (16:41):
By the way, So what's really funny is you're not
gonna like this. My whole strategy in that Martin Luther
playoff game was to go to three because too, I
was perfectly willing to go zone coach. I did not
have that chest out. We have to play man. I
wanted to succeed and win, and for us it was
playing zone against teams that were impatient and watching the film,
(17:05):
I was like, Martin Luther really doesn't settle for jump shots.
They just kind of attack and get downhill. What if
we take them out of attacking getting downhill completely? And
it ended up it didn't work, and I was a
two to three guy even though you're not gonna like this.
We were a little bit shorter and smaller, but because
I could contain the paint and it was all about
not letting anyone get shot next near the rim.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Well, I'm so happy Pastor Ken isn't here today because
he'd be like ce see then they had success. Our
special guest for the entire hour, he is Hunter Price.
He is the youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church down
in Springfield, Illinois. He is from Harrisburg, Illinois, but he's
a Packer fan, so we're gonna hang on to him
(17:48):
for a bit. You can follow him on x at
at Coach h Price and again Voice Vision Victory, Voice
Vision Victory. Wherever you listen to your podcast, google that
or just look up Hunter Price.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
You'll be able to get to any of his shows.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
And trust me, if you like high school athletics and
a lot of the things that go in that, you'll
enjoy that podcast.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
We're going to get to a break.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Other side of the break, Hunter will share his testimony
with us. This is Faith in the Zone on Fox
Sports ninety twenty in your iHeart Radio app.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Welcome back to Faith in.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
The Zone on Fox Sports ninety twenty in your iHeart
Radio app. I'm Mike mcgiven, flying solo this week Pastor
ken count and will be back next week coming from
the Donovan and Jorganson Heating and Cooling Studios. Our special guest.
He's Hunter Price, for former high school basketball coach here
in this area over at Bigfoot and he's now a
youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church in Springfield, Illinois. And
(18:46):
again he's doing a podcast that I can't recommend enough,
Voice Vision Victory wherever you listen to your podcast or
you can google Hunter Price the name of their podcast,
Voice Vision Victory. And the idea behind the podcast is
it's certain for two different groups of people, believers in
Christ or even interested who want to become the best
(19:08):
version of themselves in high school coaches and I think families, parents, grandparents,
we all of us can learn a little something from
this podcast. I really believe that you know our attitude
when we walk in the gym, if you're a coach
and assistant coach, a parent, a grandparent, you know, let's
let's check our attitude a little bit and let's find
out the real meaning why we're walking into that gym.
(19:31):
And they address this Voice Vision Victory. Take a listen,
and if you are a high school basketball fan from
the state of Wisconsin, you're going to know a lot
of his guests. You're gonna know some names that that
guys that you know either played or coached and coached
at a high level. And do do yourself a favor.
And you know, Hunter said, look, we're trying to get
this thing we're trying to be a little bit better.
(19:53):
It's really good podcasts and it's a quick listen to.
And so again Voice Vision Victory is where you're gonna
want to go, Hey, coach. The second segment of Faith
and the Zones are favorite by far, not even close.
What I get the most questions of response is segment two,
and we ask our guests to share their testimony, and
if you would be so kind, I.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Would love to. And I do want to add real
quick about the podcast, it's my guests make it, man
like they they I have nothing to do with the
quality or how good it is. That it's all the
guests who take the time out of their jobs, way
from their families to come on. So I do want
to add that that they what they are what make
it run. So I really have two short stories. If
(20:37):
that really formed the tent poles of my testimony, would
you rather be read them back to back or talk
about sorry, talk about one and stop and talk about
the other.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Let's talk. Let's start with one.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
Let's do that, all right, Let's do it, man. So,
I mean I had a pretty general upbringing as a Christian.
Amazing examples of my grandparents, my parents. I grew up
the church, going to church every Sunday morning, every Sunday night,
every Wednesday night. I really felt at home in someday schools,
youth groups, and church services. However, I do feel like
it's important to say this. Just as if you sleep
(21:10):
in your garage, you are not a car. If you
walk into a church building, you're not necessarily a firm
believer or saved yet. So I do think it's important
to say I trusted Jesus with my life. At a
young age, I realized that I was so broken and
as a sinner, and I needed a savior in my life.
So I accepted him and wanted to live my life
through the grace of Jesus. So I just what I
(21:33):
felt like that was important to say that there's nothing
I could have done to earn his love. It was
a merciful gift that he gave me. So through my
childhood I have this implicit trust in God's real I
understand that he's active in work, so I'm at church
all the time. So people are probably like, man, this
kid really gets it. He's at church all the time,
he's an athlete, all this stuff, And I would say
(21:56):
not so fast that as an adult, I realized, Oh
my gosh, there's so much immaturity in that. There's so
much attention seeking in my behavior. I think I like
the attention of kids seeing an athlete coming to youth
group and my parents being proud that I was going there,
and the leaders of the church know my name. And
I realized that although I was saved, I was not
(22:18):
a pure saint by any means. And Mike. The first
time that I came to realize this was a moment
in my senior year of high school. So, if you've
been an athlete, you know this, But if you haven't,
i'll explain it. When you're an athlete on a team,
you're around each other more than you're with your family,
because you're at eight hours a day of school, you're
(22:40):
at the time waiting until practice starts, you're in the
locker room, you're doing practice, or a bus ride or
a game, So you're with each other from anywhere between
ten to sixteen hours a day. So in theory, your
teammates should know you better than anyone. They should know
what you represent, they should know what you like, They
should know your beliefs, that should know your morals. Because
(23:01):
you're around each other so much. So after one practice,
we're kind of sitting around the locker room and I
can't find my shoe. And it was at the time
where everyone on the basketball team wore the same exact shoe,
and I missed those times. Let me tell you, I
don't like all the different colors. That's neither here nor there.
And uh so I knew it was my shoe though,
(23:22):
because I had Proverbs twenty seven seventeen written on it
and that was kind of a verse I wanted to
live by and still try to live by. And a
guy on the other side of the locker room picks
it up. He goes, hey, shoe this like, oh, that's mine, thanks,
and he looks at it weird and he throws it
to me and he goes, I didn't know you were
a Christian, And man, my heart sunk. My Like I
(23:44):
can still remember the smell in the locker room, the
music like that, the senses from it because it's so impactful,
and someone might go, that's an impactful moment for you,
But I want you to understand. These people should know
exactly what I believe, what I represent. How crummy must
I have been living my life as a believer, as
a representative of who Jesus Christ is to me, that
(24:06):
a kid who I'm spending more time with in my
family has no idea I'm a believer, And it still
forms a lot of my decision making to this day
that I'd squandered that opportunity, that I was, in my opinion,
a phony believer or someone who kept Jesus private and
put him under a pillow. And Jesus deserves to be shared.
(24:27):
He needs to be shared with someone. It's not a
secret that we keep. So I learned later that this
was called a Chiros moment. Are you familiar with that terminology?
I am not, Okay, so I'll explain it. So Chiros
was the Greek god of opportunities, and I like giving
word pictures for people to understand kind of things better.
(24:48):
So in this mythology, Chiros was this creature who had
this long lock of hair on its head, and he's
an incredibly strong and incredibly fast, and the only way
to catch him was from in front, because if he
got past you, you would never catch them again. So
you had one opportunity and urgency to catch this Cairos
before you never could catch them again. So I had
(25:11):
a Cairos moment. I had one opportunity, Mike with these kids.
I don't get to redo middle school and high school again.
I don't get to redo those times on the bus
in the locker room with those people again. Achiro's moment
for me was not seizing an opportunity to share Christ
with my teammates and with my friends. So if you're
(25:31):
listening to this, you might be in a Chiros moment
right now. There might be some in your life who
needs to hear who Jesus Christ is, who needs to
have their Savior in their life, and you're not doing it,
and you may never get the chance to again. What
if they move? What if what if something bad happens
to them? You just don't know. We need to have
(25:54):
urgency when it comes to our faith in Jesus Christ,
and not to don't save anyone until Bibles of anyone please. However,
there might be someone in your life that needs to
hear it and you may not get that opportunity again.
And I don't want you to live with their regrets
that I did by not sharing my faith with my
loved ones or my friends. So you know, when you
go through one of those things, you pocket it and
(26:15):
you're gonna hopefully utilize that later in life. So a
few years later, I got a call from sca Fellowship
of Christian Athletes, and they said, hey, we had a
huddle leader drop. I got your name from someone. Would
you mind filling in last minute at this camp? And
it was unique because I was not a college athlete,
so I was pretty disqualified from being credible in this situation.
(26:36):
But I referred back to that moment someone may need
to hear Jesus, not because of who I am, but
because of the vessel the message that I can bring.
So I thought to myself, Yes, I'm going to do it.
And that changed my life going into my career and
coaching and teaching. I would have never had that opportunity
without that camp because I went into it and undecided
(26:57):
major and left at teaching and coaching major. And I
wanted to spend my life sharing Jesus with kids. And
the last thing I'll say about this that there's so
many times when I was driving home from work and
I'd walk into the house and my wife would go,
how did it go today, And I'd say, well, I
might get fired tomorrow. What's going on. I shared Jesus
with them again, and one of these days it's going
(27:18):
to come back and get me. But I'm okay. There's
a lot of jobs out there. If you look on
any message board, lots of schools are hiring, and I'm
okay with that. So I wanted to make sure that
was a foundation of my identity in Christ that I
was going to live it out loud. If that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
It does.
Speaker 1 (27:34):
We're talking with Hunter Price, former basketball coach here in
the state of Wisconsin at Bigfoot. He's now the youth
pastor at Springfield Bible Church, and I love Look, I
don't love that the feeling you must have had when
when the kid and the locker crow said, oh, you're
a Christian?
Speaker 2 (27:53):
You know it?
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Look that that's one of those moments, like you said,
like who we're supposed to be peculiar as Christian And
the fact that I'm hanging out with this guy and
he doesn't know that about me, that that that that
moment kind of changed your life a little bit, didn't it.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
It absolutely did. We're not go and talk to youth
groups or I guess speak anywhere. I kind of share
the story And the last thing I asked the kids
is if someone found your shoe with your with your
face burth on it, what they know it's yours, Because
I think that's just so important, man, it really is.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
It definitely is.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Hey, you had said you have two Is there a
second story to your testimony? Yeah, yeah, let's let's get
let's go into that. Time wise, I do believe we
have time for this segment.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
All right, this looks a little bit more vulnerable. I
don't talk about it often, but I think in the
age of mental health, and I think it's important to advocate.
And whenever I get asked to speak place is if
I do, they ask that I talk about this because
how it's kind of out there in the easier right
now in society. So you know, when I was a kid,
I couldn't stay the night at Stone's house. I couldn't
(28:59):
sleep any about my bed without having like really bad
panic attacks. And I noticing all my friends are not
having that issue. So I have the awareness of a
child something's wrong with me. I have so much fear.
I have so much anxiety that it paralyzes me to
do things that other people are naturally just doing. So
as a kid, I'm starting to get really confused, like what,
(29:21):
like what is this? What's wrong? And this is you know,
I was kind of right before the age of being
able to talk about mental health normally, right without I
think there's neither here nor there, But there's a there's
a little bit too much of talk about excuse making,
but it's so important to talk about it in general, though,
make sure people know that it's out there. So as
a teenager, I couldn't bring myself to meet new people
(29:43):
without high amounts of anxiety. I when I had to
do a class presentation, I would freak out and I
couldn't go, Like I couldn't go to a party. I
couldn't go anywhere because I was scared all the time.
And then my heart beats super fast and I'd have
these panic attacks I didn't know at the time, and
I cry myself to sleep at night. As a teenager
(30:04):
and I go to college, it's still not any better.
So obviously I'm not taking care of it right. So
I'm starting to develop like it since the humor to
deflect my problem because they're not being discussed, they're not
being talked about, and a lot of my time in college,
to be honest with you, is just sitting in my
dorm by myself, and I missed a lot of opportunities
(30:24):
because of all this fear, all this angst. And I'll
fast forward to twenty twenty. What COVID really did, what
the shutdown did, in my opinion, is it took away
everyone's defense mechanisms, so if you struggle with X, you
can't go do why. And it made everyone deal with
their problems like head on. So my son was born
in February of twenty twenty, so he was a few
(30:46):
months old or in a We're in a two room
apartment in Beloit, Wisconsin, just the four of us, just
stuck in the small apartment. Man, kids crying, We're bored,
We're miserable. Life's been asking me to get help for
a while. She's like, you need help, like I'm telling
you as your wife, and I say no, it's embarrassing.
(31:07):
I'm not talking to anyone. I'm not saying I'm fine.
And I lost about twenty to thirty pounds during COVID
because I wasn't really eating. And then I remember this
moment exactly in April. I'm holding my son Nolan and
he's an infant, and I felt nothing, Mike, I genuinely
felt nothing. I didn't care about this child I'm holding.
(31:27):
And it was in that moment I was like, I'm
willing to get help like it. Honestly, I think that
that was the moment. And so I get in touch
with this doctor and she gives me this psychiatric evaluation.
She's asked me questions, you know, would you if you
drove off the road, would you care? Like all this stuff.
And we get down this conversation and she said, well,
here's my diagnosis, because mental health is it's interesting. There's
(31:50):
no test positive, it's an opinion. So she goes, I
would diagnose you with the high anxiety disorder out categories
categorize you as clinically depressed. So not like the SAD
I got broken up with depression like a real you
can't get out of depression. So I'm like shocked. I'm
relieved because I know it's wrong, but I'm shocked because
I'm an athlete, I'm a Christian. You can't have mental
(32:10):
health problems. You can't have problems if you have life
like this, you can't your coach and all this stuff.
So it was a struggle. So here's why I want
to share this story with you. I stumbled upon the
passage Second Corinthians twelve for my father in law, who
is also a pastor and someone that's incredibly wise. Can
I read a few verses in you bet? Okay? So
(32:34):
Second Corinthians twelve, I'll just read seven through ten real quick. Therefore,
so that I would not become arrogant, to thorn in
my flesh was given to me a messenger of Satan
to trouble me, so that I would not become arrogant.
I asked the Lord three times about this, that it
would depart from me, but he said to me, my
grace is enough for you. So my power is made
perfect in weakness. So then I will boast gladly about
(32:57):
my weakness, is that the power of Christ may side
in me. Therefore I am content with my weaknesses, with insults,
with troubles, with persecution. Built He's for sake of Christ.
For whenever I am weak, then I am strong. And
that gives me chilled every time I read it, including
right now, one of the most meaningful passages to me.
(33:19):
Paul acknowledges a few things here. His suffering is not
going to be removed, even though he pleases God to
take it away. God's not Santa Claus. He can't just
you just give him a wish list and He's going
to solve all your problems. Number two the revelations that
suffering is necessary because it ultimately is used for good.
God's grace will get us through, and that goes with
Number three. Was already saying, But that understanding, I'm going
(33:41):
to boast in my suffering because weakness provides God's an
opportunity to show his grace, to show his power. So
when I'm reading this, Mike, I'm just stopped in my tracks.
I cried myself to sleep years of my life. God,
why won't you take this anxiety away from Why? Why
are you doing this to me? What is wrong? What's
(34:03):
wrong with me? As a person, as a father, as
a friend? Like what? Why can't I get this right?
You know what? I realized, I didn't attend a single
party in my lifetimes to anxiety. I didn't hang around
bad people because of anxiety. I didn't stray from God's
call because of anxiety. I thought God wasn't being fair,
and I was even critical of who he was and
the whole entire time that anxiety problem because of those problems,
(34:27):
and he planned that before I was informed in my
mother's room. So when I'm able to do things like
this interview, like my podcast, speak at youth events, go
leave basketball teams, it's not by my own account. It's
because God's grace allows me to do this. Do I
get stressed out before an interview, Yes, But God's grace
(34:49):
allows me to do it because He has a message
for me to share with people. So if you have,
if you're listening to this and there's a thorn in
your side that you are suffering from, why won't you
remove this from my life? Lord, I've been begging you
for years and years, please remove this from my life.
It may not be there to be removed. It may
be there to draw you closer to God. So I
(35:09):
just want you to meditate on that and realize how
God might be drawing you to him.
Speaker 2 (35:15):
That's called the mic drop.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
And now that you're doing a podcast, you know what
that man, man, hey, coach, we have got to get
to a break. I've got a few questions for you
regarding your testimony. On the other side of the break,
our special guest is Hunter Price again, former head basketball
coach at Bigfoot High School here in Wisconsin. He is
now the youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church down at Springfield, Illinois.
(35:40):
In fact, tenth through the fourteenth, they've got their I
think it's VBS. I don't know if he's involved. It
might be the younger kids, but I'm on their website
June fourth through the tenth. Wild Live is what their
VBS is called. So you happen to be in Springfield,
little annoying, get the Springfield Bible Church and go out
and hang out with with Hunt your Price and Johnny's
(36:01):
Standard and john Standard.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
It looks like a good.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
Group of people that are involved in running that church.
This is Faith in the Zone on Fox Sports ninety
twenty in your iHeart Radio App. Welcome back to Faith
in the Zone on Fox Sports ninety twenty and your
iHeart Radio App. Coming from the Dotavan to Jorgans and
Heating and Cooling Studios.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
Our special guest. He is Hunter Price, and you just
heard his testimony.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
And I tell you what, man, it put tears in
my eyes because here's a guy and if you see
a picture of him, his wife is gorgeous he's really
good looking.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
Their kids are like really cute kids.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
And if this guy is willing to come on a
show like this and talk about mental health a little
bit and be able to open up, you know, I've
told the story a lot. The first time I got
asked to come speak to a men's group at a
church because of faith in the zone and I to
share my testimony, I told the pastor never call me again,
don't pass along my name and number to any of
(36:59):
your friend I'm not ever doing this again.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
He said, really why? I said, I'm really embarrassed.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
And he said, huh, so you think this is about you?
And he stopped me in my tracks hunter and he said, Mike,
on your show, you say that there are guys that
you have on the show. The worst thing they ever
deal is steal a candy bar, and that's me. And
then you share your testimony about some of the things
you were doing back in the day and drinking and
(37:26):
drugging and doing all that stuff. He said, The guys
in my church won't talk to me about that issue
because I've never had a drink. Look at the line
waiting to talk to you, and I'm like, I don't
want to talk to you anymore, leave me alone, right,
And he said, Mike, you've got to be willing to
put your big boy pants on and go to churches
that ask you to come and speak and.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
Share this testimony.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, you're right, it's embarrassing for you, but there are
people out here that will talk to you about that,
and the Lord wants you to deal.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
With those guys and help them.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
And I now know I've probably given I don't know
how many speeches at churches, not only in this area,
but a church in Michigan. The guy listens to Faith
in the Zone all the time. And they said, look, well,
well we'll pay to have you come over here and
speak to our men's group. And I said, great, let's
do it. And so I'm out there as much as
(38:20):
I can. And I don't look forward to it.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
Hunter.
Speaker 1 (38:23):
I get that anxiety that you talked about, But I
love the Hunter. I love the fact that you're willing
to share that part of your life because there are
other men and other people that listen to it show
like Faith and the Zone that might say, look, that's
exactly what I'm going through and I need maybe I
need to talk to him and guys If that's the case,
(38:44):
you go to Springfield Bible Church. You go on their
website and you can get ahold of the hundred price
you can. And trust me, if you're if you're a
Christian and these are things that you're struggling with, he'd
be willing to spend ten minutes with you on the
phone and say, look, this is what hew me, this
is this is what my father in.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Law had me do. And he's a pastor.
Speaker 1 (39:06):
And I went right to this this Second Corinthians and
I said, look that's me and so I Hunter, I
appreciate you so much, young man, and you're a young guy.
I envy the fact that you figure this out at
an early age because it took I'm one hundred percent
Irish coach, and it took me a long time. It
took me way I wasted too, way too much time
(39:27):
in my life for you know, being being stupid and
not being where I need to be in and being
grounded and to do this kind of this kind of
conversation with guys like you. And I love the fact
that you're willing to open up that part because it's
not easy.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
It's not you don't want people to know.
Speaker 1 (39:45):
Look back in the day, you rub some dirt out
on your Fine, we don't talk about our feelings were men, and.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
That's not the case. We can't do that anymore.
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Hunter, And I love the fact that you're willing to
bring that up and the fact that that Natalie said, look,
you need some he help, but I'm your wife and
I see it you need to go talk.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
I give her a ton of credit for that, Hunter.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
Yeah, I mean, it's just, uh, it brings tears in
my eyes, honestly, thinking about God's grace designing my wife
to be specifically what I need, putting me around men
who are gonna uplift me, and that sometimes I have
a lot of imposter syndrome because sometimes I go, who
(40:31):
am I? Who have these opportunities? Who am I to
to be heard from? Because it's because God's grace has
been so good to find these out. And like you said,
people don't want to talk about these things because it's
not fun. That's the thing my wife's helped me out
with the most is it's sometimes not fun is important.
(40:52):
Sometimes sitting with someone in tears is important someone Sometimes
being stuck in a long conversation is important. So I
will say if you are someone who is struggling with this,
I will give you my phone number, I'll give you
my email. I don't care how you contact me. I
would be more than willing because I think our job
is to encourage other believers, and that burst I had
(41:14):
on my shoe is iron sharpens iron. One man sharpens
another design to do this life together, and I would
be more than happy to help out in that way.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
He is Hunter Price again. He's a youth pastor at
Springfield Bible Church. You can listen to his podcast just
google Voice Vision Victory. We're going to get to a
break the other side of the break well last country.
That same question. We ask every one of our guests
at the end of Faith in the Zone, all the
uniforms you've ever put on, pull one out and let's
see what Hunter's answer is on that. This is Faith
(41:47):
in the Zone on Fox Sports nine twenty in your
iHeart Radio app. Welcome back to Faith in the Zone
on Fox Sports ninety twenty in your iHeart Radio app.
Our special guest for you, the teyor are really good guy.
I look forward to shake in his hand and beating
him in horse one day.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
Maybe not maybe, maybe just shaking his head.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
He is Hunter Price, former basketball coach, high school basketball coach.
He's now the youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church in Springfield, Illinois.
Him and his wife Natalie, and their two kids, Nolan
and Griffin, doing a great job in Springfield, Illinois. Hunter,
This last segment is a throwaway question a couple of
years ago, and I can't I just ask every week
(42:26):
because I love the answers. All the uniforms you ever
put on your entire life. We put him in a closet.
You get to pull one out to get one more
game with that team. What uniform do you pull out?
Who do you play against?
Speaker 2 (42:38):
And why?
Speaker 3 (42:41):
I told you I was gonna cheat a little bit
because kind of the uniform is kind of not But
there's only one game I want to redo on and
finish for my entire career in sports, and that's coaching
the state quarterfinals games. I'm putting my coaching uniform back
on and I'm going to why Water High School to
(43:01):
the Division three state quarterfinals, and I want to take
care of business and go to state because now that
I step down, I have to live with the fact
that I never made it and it has to be
okay with I might never ever get to do that,
which is okay, punter.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
Who did you guys? Who did you lose to?
Speaker 3 (43:21):
We lost to Milwaukee? We lost to.
Speaker 2 (43:26):
Tony Maine head coach Tony Maine.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
I know all about that team, all about the Hey
that that coach Tony Mayne was one of the best
basketball players. I'm telling you he this guy. My favorite
Tony Maine story hunter is he was a senior at
Thomas Moore. I was coaching a Dominican and we had
a fourteen little tournament going during the holidays, and I
(43:50):
think they were playing Lacrosse Aquinas and Tony missed his
first two shots and I was sitting right behind the
Aquinus benchion their coach stood up and said, hey, back
off him. I told you he's a little bit overrated.
And Tony man looked at him. He put up forty
eight on him after that. Yeah, he put up forty eight.
And Tony Maine coaches the way he played, which is
(44:13):
tough as nails. And look, I wish you could get
that game back as well, because I had the opportunity
to get to State a number of times, and I
wish that as a coach, you would have been able
to experience that.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
I would have loved it, man, I mean we were
honest in Norella run. We beat the two seed by
twenty eight points in the second round. We had the
buzzer beater over your beloved squad. In the next round.
We beat the defending state champs and racings and cats
the next round, and it was one unbelievable how did
we do that? Win after another? And then we faced
(44:46):
a team with a sixth eight kid going to the
tall St. Louis and our tallest kid is six', four
and somehow we still came a couple of shots. Short
it was one of those you probably could make a movie.
ABOUT i can't believe this is happening, sequences.
Speaker 1 (45:02):
MAN i, look that was my, conference by the, way
At Martin, luther and even At Dominican Saint, Catherines Thomas,
Moore Dominican, Kenosh's Saint. Joe's you, know the old the
Old Catholic, conference the Old metro. Conference AND i went
right back to it WHEN i went To Martin, luther
which was, tough and you beat a couple of good,
COACHES i can tell you, that and lost to a
(45:24):
really good coach as. Well hey, guys we've got to get.
Going he Is Hunter price, again the youth pastor At
Springfield Bible. Church do yourself a Favor Voice Vision. Victory
go to that. Podcast just google it or look Up
Hunter price and you can get to this podcast and and,
look he gives all the credit to their. Guests he's
(45:45):
a really good interviewer and he asked some really good.
Questions Voice Vision victory is and take a listen to
this and trust, me don't don't think you're gonna sit
there for ten minutes and then get out of. There
you're gonna get hooked LIKE i. Did you'll get hooked
like guy That Voice Vision. Victory, hey, coach thank you
so much for a couple of minutes of your.
Speaker 3 (46:03):
Time thank you so much for inviting. Man this is
a lot of.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
Fun you got it. Again he Is Hunter.
Speaker 1 (46:09):
Price this Is faith in The zone On Fox sports
ninet twenty and Your iHeart radio.
Speaker 2 (46:13):
App
Welcome to Faith in the Zone on Fox Sports nine
twenty in your iHeart Radio app. Thanks for joining us.
I'm Mike mcgimmerrein Flye Sold this week. Pastor Ken Keltner
from Brookside Baptist Church will be back in studio to
me next week, and I'm coming from live from the
Donovan and Jorganson Heating and Coolian Studios. Any issues you
have with your HVAC system, you'd have to turn your
(00:22):
air conditioner on soon. Any issues you have go to
Donovan Jorgensen dot com. So I was excited until about
I don't know, a day ago of doing this this interview.
You know, I did a bunch of work on Hunter Price.
He got coach at basketball here in the state of
Wisconsin's now a youth pastor down in Illinois. And the
(00:44):
more I dug on the Hunter Price once I found
out who was the head basketball coach at Bigfoot, and
Bigfoot beat my boys from Greendale Martin Luther after I
had retired in a regional final. I believe, and I
know exactly where I was. Look, I don't know my
nieces and nephews' names, but I know exactly where I
(01:04):
was when the kid from Bigfoot hit a shot at
the buzzer to beat my boys at Greendale Martin Luther.
I was in the parking lot of Catholic Memorial scouting
a game, and I had to run out to listen
to the last three and a half minutes of the
Bigfoot Greendale Martin Luther game. And I've been mad at
Bigfoot ever since. And now I find out that my
(01:25):
special guest today was the head basketball coach at Bigfoot
for that game. All Right, I still decided to have
a hunter come on, hey, coach, Hi, how you been?
And I know exactly where I was the moment that
kid hit the three, and I put my head down
and I just felt bad for my good friend, coach
(01:47):
Paul Wallers s time.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
That was a good win for the boys from Bigfoot.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
Yeah, I'm still thankful to be here, Mike, and I
just learned to say, I'm appreciative of what you guys
are doing using this platform to display Christ and who
he is and how he works in everyone's lives. As
someone trying to get into this space doing podcasting on
sports and faith and things like that, I look up
to you guys and what you're doing. I found your podcast.
(02:13):
I've listened. You guys do such an amazing job. I'm
super grateful you wanted to have me on. With that said,
I am not sorry about how that as it is
one of the best moments of my life. And it's
funny how sports works, right at the best moment of
someone's life is the worst moment of someone else's And
what a crazy paradigm that is a sports And I
(02:36):
will say Paul is the coach of Martin Luther, and
I respect him so much and how he's outspoken about
his face and how he coaches. And the one thing
I feel bad about was him losing in that way
and that game. And I'll tell you what too. I
texted him a few days after that game. I said,
I want to apologize. I didn't come over right away
and say a good game. And he was so gracious.
(02:58):
He was like, dude, won a regional title and a
buzzer beater. I did not expect you to just walk
over and then you know, so I was super grateful
for the way he handled it as well well.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
And I sent you a video this morning.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
And after we won that state championship again, that was
my last game and I knew that that was my
last season coach, and and I was lucky enough that
was the third one I won with Paul, and I
won some with the Christian schools and and but that
last one is really special to me because it was
it was a four year journey to get Greendale Martin
(03:32):
Luther to where we thought that they could be, and
to to to be a part of that staff and
and and hang out with coach Wallersheim on a daily basis,
and we still talk a ton. We we talk sometimes,
you know, ten times a week, just checking in what's
going on?
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Can you can you? Can you do?
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Can you run out and scout a game for me?
Real quick? I go, yeah, one hundred percent. Where do
you need me? We're seeing Saint Catherine's that live in
p Water. You give me something closer, you know, that
kind of stuff. And I can tell you that we
we we watched some film together as he was preparing
to play Bigfoot, and he, you know, we both thought
(04:13):
that this was gonna be a really good game, and
we thought your team was really well coached and ran
good stuff.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
And we we found a couple.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Of things we thought we could we could get away with, right,
some things that he thought he could get done and
the game was everything he thought except for that last
shot going in. And I talked to him, Well, they
weren't halfway back to Greendale, Martin Luther when he called
me and he said, you know what happened? I said,
(04:40):
listen to the last three and a half minutes. He said, man,
we we we had a chance. We we You know,
I'm gonna go watch the film, but I think we
had a chance to beat and they're a really good
team and it wouldn't surprise me. And he said this,
it wouldn't surprise me to see them up in Madison.
So that that tells you everything he thought about you
in that program. Hey, Hunch, as we talk the the
(05:02):
when you talked about doing some of this stuff in
that podcast, and I've listened to a lot of your stuff.
It's really good V three content at V three content,
and I would I would really recommend guys.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
It's a it's.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
A really good if you like high school sports, if
you like high school basketball. What what what they're talking
about on that podcast was really needed. You know, I
feel like we're the only ones I do that high
school basketball show every Saturday morning here on Fox Sports
nine twenty from nine am to eleven o'clock eleven am
(05:36):
every Saturday morning.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
And it used to be a lot of us a
few years ago.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
There are a lot of people doing some stuff and
there's not so much anymore, especially stuff like this, And Hunter,
talk to me a little bit before I get into
coaching and what you're doing now, talk to me about
why you started V three content and and tell me
a little bit about you know how that's going.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Thanks for letting me share about this, because it's something
I'm super passionate about. And there's a couple of reasons
why I got into it. Number One, I just loved
creating content. As a college student, I created the sports
Debate page on Facebook and it blew up and tons
of people would argue sports every day. And then at
my school, that school I was a teacher at, I
(06:19):
started the first ever sports news club and we'd report
on the sports news every week and over covid for
a bit of therapy. I wrote a book on coaching
and just wanted to get all my thoughts out and
things like that. And I just love creating things. I
love sports, so that's always been in my blood. And
then I stepped down from coaching, there's this void, right,
(06:39):
So you spent your whole life in this sport, you
spent your whole life competing and having that outlet, and
when you step down from that, that's hard to replace.
So I knew there's something I needed to do in
that to fill that void for me. So I didn't
become lazy or content or pass or have regrets about
(07:01):
life and things like that. So we're driving home from
Thanksgiving up the Chicago area and I'm in the car
with my wife and I said, Natalie, this is going
to sound so crazy, and she's like, what's going on
because she's heard some crazy ideas. And I was like,
I really think I should start a podcast. I've been
thinking about it in my mind. I've been jotting it
out since probably last summer, but I've been too embarrassed
(07:23):
to tell anyone because I don't want people to go
all this guy also is starting a podcast, or another
person who thinks he's got something to say. So that
was kind of in my mind, and I told my
wife is kind of a litmus test, and immediately Mike,
she was like, do it. You need to do it.
You have a story to tell and so it was
(07:43):
hitting the ground running after that. I've been blessed by
the Lord to have tons of connections in the coaching industry,
so right away I had tons of friends reach out
Jay binish Kin Walkin. The list goes on and on
about just people that were I would love to come
on and help you out and be a guest, and
I was just so blessed by that. So I've got
that going and people are tuning in and it's been
(08:05):
going well and fun, and I'm sitting here, I'm going
I need to share christ as well, because that would
be quite unfortunate to have this platform and not share
about the reason I'm here, the reason I'm even alive,
the reason I have life to this day. So I
talked to my colleague, one of the lead pastors at
my church, Johnny Standard, who played college basketball Wheaton, one
(08:28):
of the most amazing man I've ever met in my life,
one of the most vible, smart guys I've ever met
in my life. And I was like, dude, do you
want to do a Christian leadership type of podcast. I
don't have a huge vision right now, but I know
it's needed and I can merge these with sports fans
who might be interested in that might lead some people
(08:48):
to the Lord. And he took me up on it
right away. And you know, we're learning still. You know,
I listened to your guys's Mike and I'm like, these
guys are the professionals, fully smokes. We've got a long
way to go, spars quality and entertainment and all that stuff.
But that's how I got to it is I want
to share my passion of sports, my passion of Christ
with other people, and if I can find a platform
(09:10):
to do that, I'm going.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
To do it. Our special guest for the entire hour,
and I'm not mad at him anymore. He is Hunter
Price and you can follow him on Twitter at coach
h Price. One word at coach h Price and you can.
I would highly recommend V three content. And that's the
name of it, correct.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
It's so Voice Vision Victory is on Spotify, Apple, podcast,
and YouTube. The x account formerly known as Twitter is
at V three content, but on Spotify, Apple and YouTube
it's Voice Vision Victory. And those are the three things
that I want to really talk about in every single podcast.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
You know, I love that, and I wish my co host,
I wish pastor Ken was here the head pastor at
Brookside Baptist Church. He his father was a a pastor,
He was a youth pastor for a long time, head
head pastor at Brookside, and.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
We don't have a youth pastor.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
So he now is he's actually at a town in
New York with with uh with some some youth from
our our church, and he is he is doing this
dual role until he until we can find a youth
pastor to come serve at Brookside Baptist.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
And he's like, look, I'm sixty seven years old.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
And I'm too old to do this youth pastor stuff.
And so what I wish he was in studio with me, Hunter,
because you guys would have a lot to talk about. Hey,
so you coached at Parker Jamesville Parker and coached at Bigfoot.
Did you play?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Go ahead?
Speaker 3 (10:40):
It was okay, did you?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
And where did you play? Where'd you go to high school?
Speaker 3 (10:47):
I'm from southern Illinois, a town called Harrisburg, very very
good sports town, but at the very bottom of Illinois
by the Kentucky border.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
Okay, so you're what would that make you an Illin
NOI fan? In college basketball, Kentucky fan.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
What does that make you, dude?
Speaker 3 (11:04):
It's so messy. There's no pro sports teams near. The
Illinois scene is disappointing at best. So you kind of
grew up a free agent. So I grew up a
massive Green Bay Packers fan. Actually had a boy, and
that's all I cared about as a kid. I remember
turning on Monday night football watching Brett Barr run around,
(11:24):
and I was like, I want to for that guy.
So I have not missed a Packers game in probably
twenty years.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Yeah, I'm back liking you again. Look at that, See
how that? See how that that happens? And did you
So you played high school ball? Did you play in college?
Speaker 3 (11:41):
No? I coached through college. I I coached a couple
of high schools as an assistant, and then at the
University of Illinois Springfield, I was a student manager and
just kind of did all the dirty work for the
team and learned as much as I could.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Well, I I love the U.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
When when you decided to leave Bigfoot, I read that
that what you had written out, and you know where
you said, Look, not many schools willing to take into
twenty six year old kid with big dreams take over
their basketball program.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
But you did, Bigfoot.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
You saw the potential of me and allowed me to
find myself in developing the man that I am. After
five years, decided to step down. The decision to step
down from Bigfoot coach was what was? What was in
that decision?
Speaker 3 (12:26):
You know all those forensic shows and they're searching for
a killer and they've got you know, ropes going everywhere
else you hookcorkboard.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Yeah, it's kind.
Speaker 3 (12:34):
Of one of those things, man, where you know, I
guess the easiest way to chalk it up to be
the sovereign plan of God. It's not my own plan,
and just kind of him working. There was a lot
of just little things. I honestly, I lost the passion
for teaching. It really wasn't what it used to be.
And I owe it to kids to have a passion
(12:55):
and love what I'm doing. They don't deserve someone who's
not absolutely on fire what for for that thing? And
coaching wise, there's there's a lot of things. And I
love the kids so much. I talked to them regularly
to this day in group texts and phone calls and
all that stuff. But I came to a point where
I knew I either needed to move careers or probably
(13:19):
move schools because uh, I guess the best way to
put it was was the computing community was never fully
bought into basketball, Like we couldn't fill youth teams. I
couldn't find youth coaches and things like that. And it's
not to asparge them at all. I think everyone's got there.
They're good and they're bad. And I knew at some
point I would have to figure that out or be
(13:39):
content in my situation, right, Like, if you're not content
in your situation, that's not good for anyone. So there
was a lot of things kind of happening, and I felt,
Lord say, you need to go into ministry, and I
would have never picked that for myself, to be honest
with you, even a year away from that, and someone
said you'd be a youth pastor and be like, no,
no chance, you know. So that was by just clearly
(14:00):
by the Lord alone pushing me into that. And then
a job popped up at a church across the street
from my in laws in Springfield, Illinois, and I was like, well,
I think the Lord wanted me to take this. It
seems pretty obvious. So there's a lot of little things.
I don't regret my time all there. I thought it
was an amazing experience. And like you, like you mentioned,
(14:23):
not a whole lot of schools want to hire a
twenty six year old to lead their program and be
a main leader in their school. Some I'm forever grateful
for them for allowing me to do that hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
And what a great combination coach did to be to
be a coach of youth and then to be a
youth pastor. Like I just think that if you're coaching,
especially basketball has become a twelve month sport now, and
you're trying to lead young men to be you know,
better teammates and a better player and better kid and
(14:56):
better student, and then you go and become a youth pastor,
I think there's some synergy to that, correct.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
There absolutely is. One of the funniest things is when
I told people I was making a change, Remember when
they were shocked, But almost everyone goes, well, you know,
parents are really hard and the kids are hard to
deal with nowadays. I kind of stared at them, like, oh,
I have a teacher that was forty hours a week.
You know, this will be nothing compared to what teachers
are going through right now. So I thought that was
(15:24):
pretty funny.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Yeah, that that is. Hey, let's get to a break.
This is uh.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
I can't recommend go to this podcast Voice Vision Victory,
Voice Vision Victory and it's V three content, but voice
if you google Voice Vision Victory, if you google my
special guest, he is Hunter Price, google his name and
you'll be able to find this.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
And if you enjoyed high.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
School athletics, and it's not just high school athletics, it
really is. You know, what they're trying to do is
they're talking about a lot of different on this podcast.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
Now.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
They we've high school athletics and coaching, and I like
some of that stuff.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
What they do.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
I love listening to coaches breakdown different should we you know,
maybe we should have ran. Pastor Kellys wanted me when
I coached his boys. In fact, Hunter Pastor Ken's kids,
I coached at Calvary Baptist in Milwaukee along with my son,
and he always wanted me to run that Syracuse two
three and.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
My biggest kid was six two. My forwards were like.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Six one and five ten, And I'm like, Pastor, they
really they got six nine forwards and wings out there
that's why they can run that. And he's like, no,
you got to play zone? Were you a man de
Mander zone guy?
Speaker 3 (16:41):
By the way, So what's really funny is you're not
gonna like this. My whole strategy in that Martin Luther
playoff game was to go to three because too, I
was perfectly willing to go zone coach. I did not
have that chest out. We have to play man. I
wanted to succeed and win, and for us it was
playing zone against teams that were impatient and watching the film,
(17:05):
I was like, Martin Luther really doesn't settle for jump shots.
They just kind of attack and get downhill. What if
we take them out of attacking getting downhill completely? And
it ended up it didn't work, and I was a
two to three guy even though you're not gonna like this.
We were a little bit shorter and smaller, but because
I could contain the paint and it was all about
not letting anyone get shot next near the rim.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Well, I'm so happy Pastor Ken isn't here today because
he'd be like ce see then they had success. Our
special guest for the entire hour, he is Hunter Price.
He is the youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church down
in Springfield, Illinois. He is from Harrisburg, Illinois, but he's
a Packer fan, so we're gonna hang on to him
(17:48):
for a bit. You can follow him on x at
at Coach h Price and again Voice Vision Victory, Voice
Vision Victory. Wherever you listen to your podcast, google that
or just look up Hunter Price.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
You'll be able to get to any of his shows.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
And trust me, if you like high school athletics and
a lot of the things that go in that, you'll
enjoy that podcast.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
We're going to get to a break.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Other side of the break, Hunter will share his testimony
with us. This is Faith in the Zone on Fox
Sports ninety twenty in your iHeart Radio app.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Welcome back to Faith in.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
The Zone on Fox Sports ninety twenty in your iHeart
Radio app. I'm Mike mcgiven, flying solo this week Pastor
ken count and will be back next week coming from
the Donovan and Jorganson Heating and Cooling Studios. Our special guest.
He's Hunter Price, for former high school basketball coach here
in this area over at Bigfoot and he's now a
youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church in Springfield, Illinois. And
(18:46):
again he's doing a podcast that I can't recommend enough,
Voice Vision Victory wherever you listen to your podcast or
you can google Hunter Price the name of their podcast,
Voice Vision Victory. And the idea behind the podcast is
it's certain for two different groups of people, believers in
Christ or even interested who want to become the best
(19:08):
version of themselves in high school coaches and I think families, parents, grandparents,
we all of us can learn a little something from
this podcast. I really believe that you know our attitude
when we walk in the gym, if you're a coach
and assistant coach, a parent, a grandparent, you know, let's
let's check our attitude a little bit and let's find
out the real meaning why we're walking into that gym.
(19:31):
And they address this Voice Vision Victory. Take a listen,
and if you are a high school basketball fan from
the state of Wisconsin, you're going to know a lot
of his guests. You're gonna know some names that that
guys that you know either played or coached and coached
at a high level. And do do yourself a favor.
And you know, Hunter said, look, we're trying to get
this thing we're trying to be a little bit better.
(19:53):
It's really good podcasts and it's a quick listen to.
And so again Voice Vision Victory is where you're gonna
want to go, Hey, coach. The second segment of Faith
and the Zones are favorite by far, not even close.
What I get the most questions of response is segment two,
and we ask our guests to share their testimony, and
if you would be so kind, I.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Would love to. And I do want to add real
quick about the podcast, it's my guests make it, man
like they they I have nothing to do with the
quality or how good it is. That it's all the
guests who take the time out of their jobs, way
from their families to come on. So I do want
to add that that they what they are what make
it run. So I really have two short stories. If
(20:37):
that really formed the tent poles of my testimony, would
you rather be read them back to back or talk
about sorry, talk about one and stop and talk about
the other.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Let's talk. Let's start with one.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
Let's do that, all right, Let's do it, man. So,
I mean I had a pretty general upbringing as a Christian.
Amazing examples of my grandparents, my parents. I grew up
the church, going to church every Sunday morning, every Sunday night,
every Wednesday night. I really felt at home in someday schools,
youth groups, and church services. However, I do feel like
it's important to say this. Just as if you sleep
(21:10):
in your garage, you are not a car. If you
walk into a church building, you're not necessarily a firm
believer or saved yet. So I do think it's important
to say I trusted Jesus with my life. At a
young age, I realized that I was so broken and
as a sinner, and I needed a savior in my life.
So I accepted him and wanted to live my life
through the grace of Jesus. So I just what I
(21:33):
felt like that was important to say that there's nothing
I could have done to earn his love. It was
a merciful gift that he gave me. So through my
childhood I have this implicit trust in God's real I
understand that he's active in work, so I'm at church
all the time. So people are probably like, man, this
kid really gets it. He's at church all the time,
he's an athlete, all this stuff, And I would say
(21:56):
not so fast that as an adult, I realized, Oh
my gosh, there's so much immaturity in that. There's so
much attention seeking in my behavior. I think I like
the attention of kids seeing an athlete coming to youth
group and my parents being proud that I was going there,
and the leaders of the church know my name. And
I realized that although I was saved, I was not
(22:18):
a pure saint by any means. And Mike. The first
time that I came to realize this was a moment
in my senior year of high school. So, if you've
been an athlete, you know this, But if you haven't,
i'll explain it. When you're an athlete on a team,
you're around each other more than you're with your family,
because you're at eight hours a day of school, you're
(22:40):
at the time waiting until practice starts, you're in the
locker room, you're doing practice, or a bus ride or
a game, So you're with each other from anywhere between
ten to sixteen hours a day. So in theory, your
teammates should know you better than anyone. They should know
what you represent, they should know what you like, They
should know your beliefs, that should know your morals. Because
(23:01):
you're around each other so much. So after one practice,
we're kind of sitting around the locker room and I
can't find my shoe. And it was at the time
where everyone on the basketball team wore the same exact shoe,
and I missed those times. Let me tell you, I
don't like all the different colors. That's neither here nor there.
And uh so I knew it was my shoe though,
(23:22):
because I had Proverbs twenty seven seventeen written on it
and that was kind of a verse I wanted to
live by and still try to live by. And a
guy on the other side of the locker room picks
it up. He goes, hey, shoe this like, oh, that's mine, thanks,
and he looks at it weird and he throws it
to me and he goes, I didn't know you were
a Christian, And man, my heart sunk. My Like I
(23:44):
can still remember the smell in the locker room, the
music like that, the senses from it because it's so impactful,
and someone might go, that's an impactful moment for you,
But I want you to understand. These people should know
exactly what I believe, what I represent. How crummy must
I have been living my life as a believer, as
a representative of who Jesus Christ is to me, that
(24:06):
a kid who I'm spending more time with in my
family has no idea I'm a believer, And it still
forms a lot of my decision making to this day
that I'd squandered that opportunity, that I was, in my opinion,
a phony believer or someone who kept Jesus private and
put him under a pillow. And Jesus deserves to be shared.
(24:27):
He needs to be shared with someone. It's not a
secret that we keep. So I learned later that this
was called a Chiros moment. Are you familiar with that terminology?
I am not, Okay, so I'll explain it. So Chiros
was the Greek god of opportunities, and I like giving
word pictures for people to understand kind of things better.
(24:48):
So in this mythology, Chiros was this creature who had
this long lock of hair on its head, and he's
an incredibly strong and incredibly fast, and the only way
to catch him was from in front, because if he
got past you, you would never catch them again. So
you had one opportunity and urgency to catch this Cairos
before you never could catch them again. So I had
(25:11):
a Cairos moment. I had one opportunity, Mike with these kids.
I don't get to redo middle school and high school again.
I don't get to redo those times on the bus
in the locker room with those people again. Achiro's moment
for me was not seizing an opportunity to share Christ
with my teammates and with my friends. So if you're
(25:31):
listening to this, you might be in a Chiros moment
right now. There might be some in your life who
needs to hear who Jesus Christ is, who needs to
have their Savior in their life, and you're not doing it,
and you may never get the chance to again. What
if they move? What if what if something bad happens
to them? You just don't know. We need to have
(25:54):
urgency when it comes to our faith in Jesus Christ,
and not to don't save anyone until Bibles of anyone please. However,
there might be someone in your life that needs to
hear it and you may not get that opportunity again.
And I don't want you to live with their regrets
that I did by not sharing my faith with my
loved ones or my friends. So you know, when you
go through one of those things, you pocket it and
(26:15):
you're gonna hopefully utilize that later in life. So a
few years later, I got a call from sca Fellowship
of Christian Athletes, and they said, hey, we had a
huddle leader drop. I got your name from someone. Would
you mind filling in last minute at this camp? And
it was unique because I was not a college athlete,
so I was pretty disqualified from being credible in this situation.
(26:36):
But I referred back to that moment someone may need
to hear Jesus, not because of who I am, but
because of the vessel the message that I can bring.
So I thought to myself, Yes, I'm going to do it.
And that changed my life going into my career and
coaching and teaching. I would have never had that opportunity
without that camp because I went into it and undecided
(26:57):
major and left at teaching and coaching major. And I
wanted to spend my life sharing Jesus with kids. And
the last thing I'll say about this that there's so
many times when I was driving home from work and
I'd walk into the house and my wife would go,
how did it go today, And I'd say, well, I
might get fired tomorrow. What's going on. I shared Jesus
with them again, and one of these days it's going
(27:18):
to come back and get me. But I'm okay. There's
a lot of jobs out there. If you look on
any message board, lots of schools are hiring, and I'm
okay with that. So I wanted to make sure that
was a foundation of my identity in Christ that I
was going to live it out loud. If that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
It does.
Speaker 1 (27:34):
We're talking with Hunter Price, former basketball coach here in
the state of Wisconsin at Bigfoot. He's now the youth
pastor at Springfield Bible Church, and I love Look, I
don't love that the feeling you must have had when
when the kid and the locker crow said, oh, you're
a Christian?
Speaker 2 (27:53):
You know it?
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Look that that's one of those moments, like you said,
like who we're supposed to be peculiar as Christian And
the fact that I'm hanging out with this guy and
he doesn't know that about me, that that that that
moment kind of changed your life a little bit, didn't it.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
It absolutely did. We're not go and talk to youth
groups or I guess speak anywhere. I kind of share
the story And the last thing I asked the kids
is if someone found your shoe with your with your
face burth on it, what they know it's yours, Because
I think that's just so important, man, it really is.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
It definitely is.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Hey, you had said you have two Is there a
second story to your testimony? Yeah, yeah, let's let's get
let's go into that. Time wise, I do believe we
have time for this segment.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
All right, this looks a little bit more vulnerable. I
don't talk about it often, but I think in the
age of mental health, and I think it's important to advocate.
And whenever I get asked to speak place is if
I do, they ask that I talk about this because
how it's kind of out there in the easier right
now in society. So you know, when I was a kid,
I couldn't stay the night at Stone's house. I couldn't
(28:59):
sleep any about my bed without having like really bad
panic attacks. And I noticing all my friends are not
having that issue. So I have the awareness of a
child something's wrong with me. I have so much fear.
I have so much anxiety that it paralyzes me to
do things that other people are naturally just doing. So
as a kid, I'm starting to get really confused, like what,
(29:21):
like what is this? What's wrong? And this is you know,
I was kind of right before the age of being
able to talk about mental health normally, right without I
think there's neither here nor there, But there's a there's
a little bit too much of talk about excuse making,
but it's so important to talk about it in general, though,
make sure people know that it's out there. So as
a teenager, I couldn't bring myself to meet new people
(29:43):
without high amounts of anxiety. I when I had to
do a class presentation, I would freak out and I
couldn't go, Like I couldn't go to a party. I
couldn't go anywhere because I was scared all the time.
And then my heart beats super fast and I'd have
these panic attacks I didn't know at the time, and
I cry myself to sleep at night. As a teenager
(30:04):
and I go to college, it's still not any better.
So obviously I'm not taking care of it right. So
I'm starting to develop like it since the humor to
deflect my problem because they're not being discussed, they're not
being talked about, and a lot of my time in college,
to be honest with you, is just sitting in my
dorm by myself, and I missed a lot of opportunities
(30:24):
because of all this fear, all this angst. And I'll
fast forward to twenty twenty. What COVID really did, what
the shutdown did, in my opinion, is it took away
everyone's defense mechanisms, so if you struggle with X, you
can't go do why. And it made everyone deal with
their problems like head on. So my son was born
in February of twenty twenty, so he was a few
(30:46):
months old or in a We're in a two room
apartment in Beloit, Wisconsin, just the four of us, just
stuck in the small apartment. Man, kids crying, We're bored,
We're miserable. Life's been asking me to get help for
a while. She's like, you need help, like I'm telling
you as your wife, and I say no, it's embarrassing.
(31:07):
I'm not talking to anyone. I'm not saying I'm fine.
And I lost about twenty to thirty pounds during COVID
because I wasn't really eating. And then I remember this
moment exactly in April. I'm holding my son Nolan and
he's an infant, and I felt nothing, Mike, I genuinely
felt nothing. I didn't care about this child I'm holding.
(31:27):
And it was in that moment I was like, I'm
willing to get help like it. Honestly, I think that
that was the moment. And so I get in touch
with this doctor and she gives me this psychiatric evaluation.
She's asked me questions, you know, would you if you
drove off the road, would you care? Like all this stuff.
And we get down this conversation and she said, well,
here's my diagnosis, because mental health is it's interesting. There's
(31:50):
no test positive, it's an opinion. So she goes, I
would diagnose you with the high anxiety disorder out categories
categorize you as clinically depressed. So not like the SAD
I got broken up with depression like a real you
can't get out of depression. So I'm like shocked. I'm
relieved because I know it's wrong, but I'm shocked because
I'm an athlete, I'm a Christian. You can't have mental
(32:10):
health problems. You can't have problems if you have life
like this, you can't your coach and all this stuff.
So it was a struggle. So here's why I want
to share this story with you. I stumbled upon the
passage Second Corinthians twelve for my father in law, who
is also a pastor and someone that's incredibly wise. Can
I read a few verses in you bet? Okay? So
(32:34):
Second Corinthians twelve, I'll just read seven through ten real quick. Therefore,
so that I would not become arrogant, to thorn in
my flesh was given to me a messenger of Satan
to trouble me, so that I would not become arrogant.
I asked the Lord three times about this, that it
would depart from me, but he said to me, my
grace is enough for you. So my power is made
perfect in weakness. So then I will boast gladly about
(32:57):
my weakness, is that the power of Christ may side
in me. Therefore I am content with my weaknesses, with insults,
with troubles, with persecution. Built He's for sake of Christ.
For whenever I am weak, then I am strong. And
that gives me chilled every time I read it, including
right now, one of the most meaningful passages to me.
(33:19):
Paul acknowledges a few things here. His suffering is not
going to be removed, even though he pleases God to
take it away. God's not Santa Claus. He can't just
you just give him a wish list and He's going
to solve all your problems. Number two the revelations that
suffering is necessary because it ultimately is used for good.
God's grace will get us through, and that goes with
Number three. Was already saying, But that understanding, I'm going
(33:41):
to boast in my suffering because weakness provides God's an
opportunity to show his grace, to show his power. So
when I'm reading this, Mike, I'm just stopped in my tracks.
I cried myself to sleep years of my life. God,
why won't you take this anxiety away from Why? Why
are you doing this to me? What is wrong? What's
(34:03):
wrong with me? As a person, as a father, as
a friend? Like what? Why can't I get this right?
You know what? I realized, I didn't attend a single
party in my lifetimes to anxiety. I didn't hang around
bad people because of anxiety. I didn't stray from God's
call because of anxiety. I thought God wasn't being fair,
and I was even critical of who he was and
the whole entire time that anxiety problem because of those problems,
(34:27):
and he planned that before I was informed in my
mother's room. So when I'm able to do things like
this interview, like my podcast, speak at youth events, go
leave basketball teams, it's not by my own account. It's
because God's grace allows me to do this. Do I
get stressed out before an interview, Yes, But God's grace
(34:49):
allows me to do it because He has a message
for me to share with people. So if you have,
if you're listening to this and there's a thorn in
your side that you are suffering from, why won't you
remove this from my life? Lord, I've been begging you
for years and years, please remove this from my life.
It may not be there to be removed. It may
be there to draw you closer to God. So I
(35:09):
just want you to meditate on that and realize how
God might be drawing you to him.
Speaker 2 (35:15):
That's called the mic drop.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
And now that you're doing a podcast, you know what
that man, man, hey, coach, we have got to get
to a break. I've got a few questions for you
regarding your testimony. On the other side of the break,
our special guest is Hunter Price again, former head basketball
coach at Bigfoot High School here in Wisconsin. He is
now the youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church down at Springfield, Illinois.
(35:40):
In fact, tenth through the fourteenth, they've got their I
think it's VBS. I don't know if he's involved. It
might be the younger kids, but I'm on their website
June fourth through the tenth. Wild Live is what their
VBS is called. So you happen to be in Springfield,
little annoying, get the Springfield Bible Church and go out
and hang out with with Hunt your Price and Johnny's
(36:01):
Standard and john Standard.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
It looks like a good.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
Group of people that are involved in running that church.
This is Faith in the Zone on Fox Sports ninety
twenty in your iHeart Radio App. Welcome back to Faith
in the Zone on Fox Sports ninety twenty and your
iHeart Radio App. Coming from the Dotavan to Jorgans and
Heating and Cooling Studios.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
Our special guest. He is Hunter Price, and you just
heard his testimony.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
And I tell you what, man, it put tears in
my eyes because here's a guy and if you see
a picture of him, his wife is gorgeous he's really
good looking.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
Their kids are like really cute kids.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
And if this guy is willing to come on a
show like this and talk about mental health a little
bit and be able to open up, you know, I've
told the story a lot. The first time I got
asked to come speak to a men's group at a
church because of faith in the zone and I to
share my testimony, I told the pastor never call me again,
don't pass along my name and number to any of
(36:59):
your friend I'm not ever doing this again.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
He said, really why? I said, I'm really embarrassed.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
And he said, huh, so you think this is about you?
And he stopped me in my tracks hunter and he said, Mike,
on your show, you say that there are guys that
you have on the show. The worst thing they ever
deal is steal a candy bar, and that's me. And
then you share your testimony about some of the things
you were doing back in the day and drinking and
(37:26):
drugging and doing all that stuff. He said, The guys
in my church won't talk to me about that issue
because I've never had a drink. Look at the line
waiting to talk to you, and I'm like, I don't
want to talk to you anymore, leave me alone, right,
And he said, Mike, you've got to be willing to
put your big boy pants on and go to churches
that ask you to come and speak and.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
Share this testimony.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, you're right, it's embarrassing for you, but there are
people out here that will talk to you about that,
and the Lord wants you to deal.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
With those guys and help them.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
And I now know I've probably given I don't know
how many speeches at churches, not only in this area,
but a church in Michigan. The guy listens to Faith
in the Zone all the time. And they said, look, well,
well we'll pay to have you come over here and
speak to our men's group. And I said, great, let's
do it. And so I'm out there as much as
(38:20):
I can. And I don't look forward to it.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
Hunter.
Speaker 1 (38:23):
I get that anxiety that you talked about, But I
love the Hunter. I love the fact that you're willing
to share that part of your life because there are
other men and other people that listen to it show
like Faith and the Zone that might say, look, that's
exactly what I'm going through and I need maybe I
need to talk to him and guys If that's the case,
(38:44):
you go to Springfield Bible Church. You go on their
website and you can get ahold of the hundred price
you can. And trust me, if you're if you're a
Christian and these are things that you're struggling with, he'd
be willing to spend ten minutes with you on the
phone and say, look, this is what hew me, this
is this is what my father in.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Law had me do. And he's a pastor.
Speaker 1 (39:06):
And I went right to this this Second Corinthians and
I said, look that's me and so I Hunter, I
appreciate you so much, young man, and you're a young guy.
I envy the fact that you figure this out at
an early age because it took I'm one hundred percent
Irish coach, and it took me a long time. It
took me way I wasted too, way too much time
(39:27):
in my life for you know, being being stupid and
not being where I need to be in and being
grounded and to do this kind of this kind of
conversation with guys like you. And I love the fact
that you're willing to open up that part because it's
not easy.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
It's not you don't want people to know.
Speaker 1 (39:45):
Look back in the day, you rub some dirt out
on your Fine, we don't talk about our feelings were men, and.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
That's not the case. We can't do that anymore.
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Hunter, And I love the fact that you're willing to
bring that up and the fact that that Natalie said, look,
you need some he help, but I'm your wife and
I see it you need to go talk.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
I give her a ton of credit for that, Hunter.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
Yeah, I mean, it's just, uh, it brings tears in
my eyes, honestly, thinking about God's grace designing my wife
to be specifically what I need, putting me around men
who are gonna uplift me, and that sometimes I have
a lot of imposter syndrome because sometimes I go, who
(40:31):
am I? Who have these opportunities? Who am I to
to be heard from? Because it's because God's grace has
been so good to find these out. And like you said,
people don't want to talk about these things because it's
not fun. That's the thing my wife's helped me out
with the most is it's sometimes not fun is important.
(40:52):
Sometimes sitting with someone in tears is important someone Sometimes
being stuck in a long conversation is important. So I
will say if you are someone who is struggling with this,
I will give you my phone number, I'll give you
my email. I don't care how you contact me. I
would be more than willing because I think our job
is to encourage other believers, and that burst I had
(41:14):
on my shoe is iron sharpens iron. One man sharpens
another design to do this life together, and I would
be more than happy to help out in that way.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
He is Hunter Price again. He's a youth pastor at
Springfield Bible Church. You can listen to his podcast just
google Voice Vision Victory. We're going to get to a
break the other side of the break well last country.
That same question. We ask every one of our guests
at the end of Faith in the Zone, all the
uniforms you've ever put on, pull one out and let's
see what Hunter's answer is on that. This is Faith
(41:47):
in the Zone on Fox Sports nine twenty in your
iHeart Radio app. Welcome back to Faith in the Zone
on Fox Sports ninety twenty in your iHeart Radio app.
Our special guest for you, the teyor are really good guy.
I look forward to shake in his hand and beating
him in horse one day.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
Maybe not maybe, maybe just shaking his head.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
He is Hunter Price, former basketball coach, high school basketball coach.
He's now the youth pastor at Springfield Bible Church in Springfield, Illinois.
Him and his wife Natalie, and their two kids, Nolan
and Griffin, doing a great job in Springfield, Illinois. Hunter,
This last segment is a throwaway question a couple of
years ago, and I can't I just ask every week
(42:26):
because I love the answers. All the uniforms you ever
put on your entire life. We put him in a closet.
You get to pull one out to get one more
game with that team. What uniform do you pull out?
Who do you play against?
Speaker 2 (42:38):
And why?
Speaker 3 (42:41):
I told you I was gonna cheat a little bit
because kind of the uniform is kind of not But
there's only one game I want to redo on and
finish for my entire career in sports, and that's coaching
the state quarterfinals games. I'm putting my coaching uniform back
on and I'm going to why Water High School to
(43:01):
the Division three state quarterfinals, and I want to take
care of business and go to state because now that
I step down, I have to live with the fact
that I never made it and it has to be
okay with I might never ever get to do that,
which is okay, punter.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
Who did you guys? Who did you lose to?
Speaker 3 (43:21):
We lost to Milwaukee? We lost to.
Speaker 2 (43:26):
Tony Maine head coach Tony Maine.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
I know all about that team, all about the Hey
that that coach Tony Mayne was one of the best
basketball players. I'm telling you he this guy. My favorite
Tony Maine story hunter is he was a senior at
Thomas Moore. I was coaching a Dominican and we had
a fourteen little tournament going during the holidays, and I
(43:50):
think they were playing Lacrosse Aquinas and Tony missed his
first two shots and I was sitting right behind the
Aquinus benchion their coach stood up and said, hey, back
off him. I told you he's a little bit overrated.
And Tony man looked at him. He put up forty
eight on him after that. Yeah, he put up forty eight.
And Tony Maine coaches the way he played, which is
(44:13):
tough as nails. And look, I wish you could get
that game back as well, because I had the opportunity
to get to State a number of times, and I
wish that as a coach, you would have been able
to experience that.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
I would have loved it, man, I mean we were
honest in Norella run. We beat the two seed by
twenty eight points in the second round. We had the
buzzer beater over your beloved squad. In the next round.
We beat the defending state champs and racings and cats
the next round, and it was one unbelievable how did
we do that? Win after another? And then we faced
(44:46):
a team with a sixth eight kid going to the
tall St. Louis and our tallest kid is six', four
and somehow we still came a couple of shots. Short
it was one of those you probably could make a movie.
ABOUT i can't believe this is happening, sequences.
Speaker 1 (45:02):
MAN i, look that was my, conference by the, way
At Martin, luther and even At Dominican Saint, Catherines Thomas,
Moore Dominican, Kenosh's Saint. Joe's you, know the old the
Old Catholic, conference the Old metro. Conference AND i went
right back to it WHEN i went To Martin, luther
which was, tough and you beat a couple of good,
COACHES i can tell you, that and lost to a
(45:24):
really good coach as. Well hey, guys we've got to get.
Going he Is Hunter price, again the youth pastor At
Springfield Bible. Church do yourself a Favor Voice Vision. Victory
go to that. Podcast just google it or look Up
Hunter price and you can get to this podcast and and,
look he gives all the credit to their. Guests he's
(45:45):
a really good interviewer and he asked some really good.
Questions Voice Vision victory is and take a listen to
this and trust, me don't don't think you're gonna sit
there for ten minutes and then get out of. There
you're gonna get hooked LIKE i. Did you'll get hooked
like guy That Voice Vision. Victory, hey, coach thank you
so much for a couple of minutes of your.
Speaker 3 (46:03):
Time thank you so much for inviting. Man this is
a lot of.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
Fun you got it. Again he Is Hunter.
Speaker 1 (46:09):
Price this Is faith in The zone On Fox sports
ninet twenty and Your iHeart radio.
Speaker 2 (46:13):
App
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