TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Football has been an alley for many former South Dakota athletes to take the next step in their athletic career.

Whether it’s playing in college or even making it to the NFL, it’s rare, but not uncommon to see South Dakota products at a bigger stage.

And two South Dakota natives have been able to turn their athletic career into a longtime coaching career, and are now working together for one of the best football programs in the country.

Rapid City Central grad Josh Storms and Sioux Falls Washington alum Tom Farniok have coached the strength and conditioning program for the Florida State Seminoles football team for the past five seasons, but their journeys to Tallahassee are vastly different.

Storms is a 1997 graduate of the Cobblers and went on to play tight end at the University of South Dakota, but was riddled with injuries leading to a short college playing career.

“I got in a car accident one summer, injured my neck, and I was actually done playing after that,” Storms said. “That's kind of what started my journey in strength and condition.”

After his playing career was over, Storms wanted to find his way into coaching through strength and conditioning, and got his start as a seasonal assistant strength coach intern in the NFL.

Florida State's Josh Storms during warmups of a Florida State football game. (Florida State Athletics)

“I literally sent two resumes,” Storms said. “I sent one to the Vikings and one to the Chiefs, and I actually got offered both those spots. The day after Christmas, accepted the one with the Vikings. Went up there during spring break that year, worked OTAs, went back, finished the spring semester in Vermillion, and then moved up to that summer, did the internship for the summer.”

After earning his undergraduate degree from USD in 2001, Storms was looking for another opportunity to stay in coaching and did so down at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas (UNLV), working for former World’s Strongest Man competitor Mark Phillipi. 

Storms started as a graduate assistant before moving into a paid position, which led him to Arizona State to be an assistant head coach where he went through three different head coaching changes in 11 years in Tempe, which he says was a pivotal part in his coaching career.

“I spent 11 seasons there, so three different head coaches, a ton of learning experience,” Storms said. “A very fortunate kind of point in most coaches' careers that are making a move every couple of years trying to advance. I decided to stay and do it all from the same office.”

While at ASU, Storms connected with offensive coordinator Mike Norvell and the two built a relationship that would keep their careers connected.

In 2015, Norvell took the head coaching job at Memphis, taking Storms with him to be the head strength and conditioning coach, helping the Tigers compete in three conference championships, winning one in 2019, and competing in the Cotton Bowl that year as well.

Following the 2019 season, Norvell had another job opportunity as the head coach of the Seminoles which he accepted, bringing Storms with him once again as Director of Football Strength and Conditioning at FSU.

“We've always gotten along and with my role, I was in there as our assistant head coach at Arizona State so I think he had the opportunity to be able to see me kind of operate as a head guy for years before ever being a head guy,” Storms said of his relationship with Norvell. “And was able to kind of visualize what I could get in that role for him, to help him with whatever program he chose to go to.”

As soon as Storms accepted the position, he quickly got on the phone with coach Farniok, who was an assistant strength coach at Stanford at the time, but his path to the Seminoles was a wild and bumpy road.

As a high schooler, Farniok was a Sioux Falls Washington offensive lineman looking to play FBS football, but says it was a struggle to get notice from programs in South Dakota going to camps.

“We'd play and I did really well, and they're all like ‘OK, who's offered you?’ And I was like, no one. And you know, all the Rivals.com and the ESPN and the scout.com I think back in the day were like ‘Where are you from?’ and I was like Sioux Falls, South Dakota and they go ‘Oh that's why, no one recruits there.’ ”

Schools had given Farniok a walk-on offer but that was until he went to an Iowa State football camp, where he received an offer right away. He went on to be a four-year starter at center for the Iowa State Cyclones.

“This is where I fell in love with strength conditioning,” Farniok said of his college career. “To have an incredible strength conditioning coach and staff in college in Yancy McKnight and his assistants and that really developed me into the football player that I was able to become, and gave me a shot to have a chance in the NFL.”

From his time in Ames, Farniok was able to develop into a high-level player and signed as an undrafted free agent with the Vikings for the 2015 offseason. But his personal experiences as a player was enough to push him down the path of strength and conditioning.

“I didn't make it in the NFL, but I did make it to it, and I know that would not have been the case if I didn't have such great development from my college strength conditioning staff,” Farniok said. “And that's kind of where I fell in love with it, because I saw the change and impact you could have on athletes’ lives and performance and that's when I decided what I wanted to do in my life.”

In fall 2015, Farniok waited for another opportunity to make it in the NFL. He went back home and substitute taught in the Sioux Falls School District and even worked as the offensive line coach at Sioux Falls Washington, helping the Warriors and his two younger brothers win the Class 11AAA championship that season. But the end of the high school season meant Farniok was away from football yet again.

“I was very real with myself about five weeks into the process after getting cut,” Farniok said. “If no one's called by now, it's probably not looking good and I was real with what my talent level was like. For me to have an NFL career, I'm gonna have to get very lucky and find the right place at the right time. So it's time to start really thinking about what I want to do next, or where I want to go next.”

Through his connections at Iowa State, Farniok found an internship at the University of Houston where he made just $1,000 a month, but he got his start in strength and conditioning at the college level.

Florida State's Tom Farniok coaching at FSU. (Florida State Athletics)

Farniok made a short stint with another internship at the University of Buffalo for about half a year before returning to Houston once again, this time as a full-time position. But when things were finally looking up for Farniok, they quickly went down. The university fired the head coach at the time, Major Applewhite, along with everyone on staff.

“When they fire the head coach, everyone else typically gets fired, so they fired everyone else associated with the football program, and I actually fell on hard times again, and actually couldn't find a job,” Farniok said.

He was forced into another internship role at Louisiana Tech University where he was back on an internship salary making just $750 a month.

“I was back to square one,” Farniok said. “And when I was there, it's just hard and it's a lot of hours and a lot of time invested and you sacrifice a lot of your life. And I was like I have to make money. I need to expand my network, and I need to see if I can keep doing this. Because I got $750 a month, it does not get you anywhere in life.”

Farniok loaded up his truck with bottled water and sandwiches and travelled to five colleges in five days, including Iowa State, the University of Missouri, Ole Miss, and Memphis, which was where he met coach Storms.

Farniok knew Storms was a fellow South Dakotan and was able to sit in for a day and watch Memphis practice and connect with Storms about football, a pivotal moment in his coaching career.

Farniok was offered a strength job at Stanford but only stayed for the 2019 season when he got the call from Storms to come to Florida State.

“There's not a lot of us guys from South Dakota, you kind of see some of a similar mindset and work ethic and those types of things right away.

“Seeing the type of guy that on a cross country move, took the time to stop in and spend time with us for a couple of days,” Storms said of hiring Farniok. “We get to know him a bit more. Get to see his personality, how he fits with the kind of guys I like on my staff and stuff. It was a no-brainer.”

Storms is the Director of Football Strength and Conditioning at FSU, meaning he’s in charge of getting all other strength coaches on the same page, focusing on their strengths to put the players in the best situation to succeed.

“If I'm just writing the program and go drop to their desk and say, ‘Hey, we're doing this,’ I'm selling short what kind of program we can ultimately run,” Storms said. “So for me, it's trying to identify the strengths in my staff members and then how the most you know utilize their strengths to make our program better, how to help those guys develop the barriers they still need to work on.”

And for Farniok, the Seminoles’ deputy director of football strength and conditioning, he mainly works with offensive and defensive lineman, but has relationships with everyone on the roster during the season.

“You might have guys with different limitations, physically due to injury history, body dimensions, you name it, and you have to find out what is best for not only that athlete, but also the 100 other athletes on the roster,” Farniok said. “So you have to do some global programming with a specified approach.”

But both say the most rewarding part of the job is watching players who put in the work all offseason, finally get the payoff they deserve on Saturday’s, including the likes of a top-10 win over No. 8 Alabama to kickoff the 2025 season.

“It's really cool to see the look on their faces and the enjoyment and just the overall euphoric feeling of winning a big game that never gets old,” Farniok said. “It's really, really cool to see athletes achieve lifelong goals, dreams, and team goals. Take it one step further. See someone's whole trajectory of their life change because they became a first-round draft pick. See someone's whole trajectory of their family's life change because they get called, they get drafted in the NFL.”

“Those moments are huge,” Storms said. “And to be honest, we all know how hard it is to win. I don't care who you're playing, but when you've seen the work, and you see the approaches taken, you’re never surprised by those moments. What you feel is the sense of fulfillment.”