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Pasco hires coach
By GREG AUMAN, Times Staff Writer
DADE CITY -- Pasco High School, home to the county's only football state championship, took a major step toward returning to its glory years Tuesday, bringing in a new head coach who has won three state titles in the past five years. Dale Caparaso, 46, has built a successful program at Bellingham High in southeast Massachusetts, with a team that could win another title this fall. But warmer climates finally lured the native New Englander south for a career change, and he'll now call Pasco home. "This is something I've wanted to do for a number of years -- I've had as much of the cold as I can take," said Caparaso. He will succeed Ricky Thomas, who resigned after a 6-4 season and the school's first playoff berth in four years. "I've done a lifetime's worth of freezing, so this has been in the back of my mind, and we just decided to act on it." Caparaso mailed resumes to openings in Florida and set up interviews last week at three schools: Kissimmee Poinciana, Pasco and Sebring. The interviews started Thursday, and by Friday afternoon, all three schools had offered him jobs. What made him choose Pasco was the same thing that principal Pat Reedy liked in him: a dedication not only to his athletes but to helping teenagers off the field. "The No. 1 reason was because I was very impressed with Mr. Reedy and Mr. (athletic director Willie) Broner," Caparaso said. "I like their commitment to the kids, to the community and to athletics in general. They impressed me very much." Reedy had a long list of qualified local applicants, including Dunnellon coach Perry Brown, who guided Pasco to its state crown in 1992. The candidates offered a compelling mix of experience -- such as longtime Robinson coach Bud Hodgens, who had 38 years in coaching -- and youth, as in current Pasco defensive coordinator, Will Dettor, who is only 24 but entering his seventh year of coaching. "Coach Caparaso earned the nod . . . for being the candidate who is not only successful on the field, but just as important, successful off the field in meeting the academic, character and leadership development needs of his student-athletes," Reedy said in a statement. "His experience . . . combined with his relentless work ethic, dedication and variety of experiences in different settings gave him the total package we were looking for." By the sound of things, they're also getting a real character. After Caparaso's last state championship in 2001, a newspaper story described the 5-foot-11, 240-pound coach as "unshaven, wrapped in a long, black coat, wearing shades and going kinda nuts. Part Grizzly Adams, part Seinfeld's Kramer." Once a linebacker at James Madison, he endured 0-10 seasons in his first two head coaching stops in Virginia before finding success in Massachusetts, where he spent 12 of his 21 years as a head coach at Bellingham. Bellingham had three winning seasons in 35 years before he arrived in 1991, but he had a state title in his third year. He has won with running games and with passing attacks -- his '93 team had a 2,000-yard rusher, but his quarterback this season set a state record with 35 touchdown passes and threw for more than 8,700 yards in four years. "I consider myself a pretty intense man, and as a team, our intensity comes from our expectations of each other," he said. "I've always expected perfection, from myself, from my coaches, from my players, and I don't think I'll ever get it. But if you don't strive for that, you settle for mediocrity." After state titles in 2000 and 2001, he settled for 10-1 last fall, the only loss coming on a 40-yard, last-minute field goal that kept his team out of the playoffs. He's moving to a county where three teams with four or more losses earned playoff berths, just another way Caparaso said his life is changing. Massachusetts needs a short playoff season because a first-round game he watched last year was played in subzero temperatures; his 2001 state title game was "a balmy 32 degrees that made us feel like getting into T-shirts and shorts." Leaving Bellingham won't be easy, even if today's high is 28 degrees with morning snow forecast. His staff is mostly former players, and Caparaso, like Bucs coach Jon Gruden, is a man who gets to work early and stays until dark most nights, not needing much more than football and his family in his life. "Telling the kids I'm going, it should be one of the most difficult times of my life," he said. "We're a very tight family, so it'll be tough. They know I interviewed, and they don't want me to go, because we're all so close. But there's always going to be a junior class, always somebody else to keep you there, and knowing that is what prompted me to do this now." Caparaso and his wife, Mary, are special education teachers who have commuted each day from nearby Smithfield, R.I., and they'll move to Florida with their son, Zachary, 12, and daughter, Bethany, an 18-year-old college freshman. She, too, is eager for a new opportunity in the Sunshine State -- within minutes of Caparaso telling his children of the decision to leave the only home they've known, she returned from her bedroom with college pamphlets from Central Florida and South Florida. He'll have a challenge awaiting him at Pasco, where the Pirates' leading passer and rusher are graduating, as well as key defensive leaders. A promising hire might help the Pirates avoid the transfers that have let top players slip away in past years. As to what kind of football to expect, Caparaso runs a Delaware Wing-T offense that typically employs three running backs, but he's had success almost exclusively running the ball and also by relying on passing. He'll wait to meet his players before he chooses the direction for his new team. "I'm a big guy, so when I go into the ice cream parlor, I like having two scoops of ice cream rather than one," he said. "You don't always get to have two scoops, but I think you can also win with just one."
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