Quantcast

The DNAinfo archives brought to you by WNYC.
Read the press release here.

Taft Football to Get New Leader After Principal Dismisses Coach of 11 Years

By Heather Cherone | December 18, 2014 5:26am
 Dan Paplaczyk will replace Matt Walsh as head coach of Taft High School's football team.
Dan Paplaczyk will replace Matt Walsh as head coach of Taft High School's football team.
View Full Caption
DNAinfo/Heather Cherone

NORWOOD PARK — Taft High School will have a new football coach for the first time in more than a decade with the selection on Wednesday of St. Viator assistant head coach Dan Paplaczyk.

Paplaczyk will replace computer and information technology teacher Matt Walsh, who coached the Eagles' football team for 11 years and won the Big Shoulders Conference this fall with a 7-3 record, advancing to the state playoffs.

Principal Mark Grishaber said Taft needed a football coach that could establish the Eagles as a "perennial powerhouse" that would spur the best athletes on the Far Northwest Side to attend Taft. 

"Coach Pap possesses a unique understanding of how developing the right level of commitment and desire from players will translate to success," Grishaber said, praising Paplaczyk as "a throwback coach who believes in education before athletics."

Students protested the dismissal of Walsh as football coach, launching an online petition signed by 385 people, many of whom said they have played for Walsh and said he was "like a father to us on and off the field."

Grishaber said he did not read the online petition.

"Replacing a coach at a school is never an easy decision and one that I did not take lightly, but in the end I know it is in the best interest of our students," Grishaber said, adding that he got about the same amount of emails praising him for dismissing Walsh as he did urging him to keep Walsh.

Walsh, who will remain at Taft as a teacher, was one of four finalists for the head coaching job, Grishaber said.

Paplaczyk was assistant head coach and offensive coordinator at St. Viator High School in Arlington Heights for three years, where he helped lead the team to the second round of the state playoffs this fall after beating two of Taft's biggest rivals — Notre Dame College Prep and St. Patrick High School — by healthy margins.

As a player and coach at Driscoll Catholic High School in Addison, which closed in 2009, Paplaczyk was a member of seven consecutive state championship teams.

Paplaczyk was the unanimous pick of the selection committee made up of Athletic Director Ryan Glowacz, basketball coach Nick Nishibayashi, Taft Assistant Principal David Bell, Grishaber and Taft alum Jim Grabowski, who played for the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears from 1966-71.

Paplaczyk, who works as a freight analyst for Omron Automotive Electronics in the western suburbs according to his LinkedIn page, will earn a $6,000 stipend to coach Taft's football team.

Grishaber was hired as principal of Taft in July after promising to transform it into one of the city's best and to improve its less-than-stellar reputation. 

Since taking over Taft, Grishaber has made a number of changes at the city's most crowded high school, including ending the school's dress code and ban on cell phone use on campus while overseeing the final stages of a $17 million renovation.

For more neighborhood news, listen to DNAinfo Radio here: