After retirements of 3 CMass football coaching legends, how do the all-time records stack up?

Nothing about the details of the various football sidelines in Central Mass. will change in 2023.

They will still be straight and white. They will still extend 120 yards from the back of one end zone to the back of the other. The action will stop when a player crosses a sideline, and the first down posts-and-chain will still be stationed along a sideline.

What will change in 2023, however, are some of the people behind those sidelines — a trio of coaches who have been there for a total of 67 football seasons.

MORE: Check out the complete list of active coaching records

Dan McAnespie has retired from Hudson after 27 years coaching there and at Lowell Catholic. John Andreoli is gone from St. John’s after 19 autumns. Frank Koumanelis has stepped down at Southbridge some 21 seasons after he started.

The exact numbers are 76 seasons, 718 games coached and 401 victories. There is definitely a new look to high school football in Central Mass. this year.

McAnespie and Andreoli coached at schools with similar philosophies toward their staffs. It might be ungrammatical, but it is accurate.

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Hudson has had just three coaches in a span of 65 years starting with 1958, when Vic Rimkus came over from a year at Hopkinton High. Rimkus coached Hudson through 1992 and won 174 games. Herb Busch coached for five seasons, then McAnespie arrived after two years helping inaugurate the football program at Lowell Catholic.

McAnespie’s career record is 146-147, including two seasons at Lowell Catholic. He was 146-129 at Hudson, including a 17-5 mark his last two seasons there. McAnespie’s teams qualified for a Super Bowl berth in 2010 and 2011.

St. John’s has had three coaches in 54 years. Bob Bradley was there from 1969 through 1983 and went 90-51-5. He was succeeded by Tony Wood, who coached through 2003 with a record of 128-71-1. Andreoli retired with a 156-64 mark, capturing the most wins in Pioneers history.

St. John’s had a perfect 13-0 season in 2017 and scored 588 points, second-most in state history after Everett’s 1914 squad that also went 13-0 and outscored the opposition, 600-0.

That Everett team was coached by Cleo O’Donnell, who later coached Holy Cross, Andreoli’s alma mater.

Under Andreoli, St. John’s qualified for nine Super Bowls and won six, including the 2017 Division 3 state game over North Attleborough.

Koumanelis finished with a career record of 99-124 at Southbridge. He has the second-most victories of any coach at that school, which has a storied history going back to 1896. Only Don Marino had more at 153. He coached at Southbridge from 1960 through 1984.

The Pioneers’ last two Super Bowl teams, 2009 and 2011, were both coached by Koumanelis.

Beyond his won-lost record, Koumanelis kept football alive at Southbridge. The football program there has dealt with demographic issues and some tumultuous years in general in the school system.

McAnespie is being succeeded by Zac Attaway, a former player at Hudson High. Andreoli’s successor is John Vassar, a St. John’s alum who played football for the Pioneers, and Nick Clark takes over for Koumanelis.

With Andreoli, McAnespie and Koumanelis off the sidelines, there are 10 coaches in Central Mass. with at least 200 games to their credit. That includes games coached outside Central Mass.

The top five are Ken LaChapelle of Northbridge; Sean Mulcahy of Doherty; Mike Dubzinski of Wachusett, who also coached at Natick; Tim Griffiths of Leicester and Quabbin; and Murdock’s Jim Tansey, who also has coached at Tyngsborough and Nashoba Tech.

LaChapelle is the all-time state leader in games coached with 522. Abington’s Jim Kelliher is second with 520. Kelliher has announced that this will be his final season at Abington.

Mulcahy has coached 347 games. He became the Highlanders coach midway through the 1990 season, taking over for Bill Erven. Doherty, which began play in 1966, has had only four coaches during that time. Jack Whalen and Ralph Raymond are the others.

Dubzinski has coached 317 games. He won 167 games in 24 years at Wachusett. To put that in perspective, Herb Grayson — who inaugurated the game at Holden High in 1926 — is second with 46 victories. Dubzinski also won 24 games in five years at Natick from 1994-98.

Griffiths has coached 298 games. He has won 170, 166 of them at Leicester in two separate stints there. He won the other four during a three-year hiatus as Quabbin. Tansey is heading into his 28th season and is 25-20-0 in five years at Murdock. He is, to date, the only Murdock coach since 1925 with a record five games above .500. Overall, Tansey has coached 289 games.

So there will still be some familiar faces along the Central Mass. sidelines. Just not as many as in 2022.

The list

A list of active Central Mass. football coaches and their records, compiled both in the region and at any other Massachusetts schools they may have coached at.

—Contact Bill Ballou at sports@telegram.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @BillBallouTG.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: A complete listing of the won/lost records of active Central Mass. football coaches