After ten years with the Kern County Sheriff’s Office, Rick Van Horne began teaching in for the Kern High School District.  As a third-generation Bakersfield High School alumnus who became a Friday Night Hero, as did his father and son as championship players for the BHS Drillers. Rick Van Horne began his coaching career at BHS in 1984. He later served as head coach at East High and Liberty High (where he guided his team to a Valley Championship in 2001). In 1998, Rick Van Horne was selected All-Area Coach of the Year for football. Rick Van Horne is the author of Friday Night Heroes: 100 Years of Driller Football.

According to the book description of, Friday Night Heroes: 100 Years of Driller Football it, “is the first comprehensive history of California’s best high school football program of the 1900’s, the Bakersfield High School Drillers. The makings of an American football dynasty took shape in 1896 with a first high school football game played amid the rolling farmlands and acres of oil derricks of the San Joaquin Valley of California. The Bakersfield High School Drillers would lead the way in California from the early days of the new phenomenon of high school football, and continue to enthrall fans throughout the 20th century. Author (and former BHS player and coach) Rick Van Horne chronicles each decade of championship seasons, accompanied by engaging stories from on and off the field. The book contains detailed player, team and season records, and profiles of all the players and coaches that made the Drillers great. More than a decade of research, hundreds of interviews and previously unpublished personal diary excerpts contributed to Friday Night Heroes, including the school’s role as the training ground for Frank Gifford and other later college and professional football greats.”