Greg Russo named head football coach at Paramus Catholic
Greg Russo ran through a gamut of emotions on the way to his Paramus Catholic High School homecoming.
The Paladins’ football program announced Russo as its new head coach Thursday afternoon, welcoming home the 1998 graduate who spent the last five seasons at Northern Highlands.
Russo, 41, spent two years as an assistant with the Highlanders before taking over the top job, and he elevated them from good to great. The Allendale team went 26-6 over the past three seasons, winning two sectional titles after having not done so since 1978.
That made Thursday morning’s goodbye to his Northern Highlands player all the more difficult.
“It was a very emotional day. Part of it was like, it’s so hard to say goodbye to those kids – I love those guys,” Russo said when contacted by phone. “So, as much as I’m excited to be [at Paramus Catholic], it probably didn’t seem like it when I got here, because I just came from there.
“Now it’s starting to get to the point where it’s like, ‘Oh, this is going to be fun and exciting.’ But it’s bittersweet.”
Russo said he had gotten people calling with other coaching offers during his Highlanders tenure, but “Really, I was happy there, and I didn’t want to leave.
“I loved my time at Highlands,” he added. “I love the kids, the families were great, the administration there was great, I had a ton of support. I wouldn’t change my five years there for anything. … That’s why it was so hard to leave.”
His alma mater, though, was the only place that could make him change his mind.
The former running back/safety was a member of the Paladins’ 1997 Parochial Group 3 championship squad – “My team was the first to win a state title here,” he said proudly – and he was the school’s offensive coordinator from 2010-16.
“I went here. My father went here, my brother went here, my uncles went here, my cousins went here,” Russo said. “I coached here for all that time and had a great experience – so, there’s a special attachment here, and to me, there’s no better place to really get a program rolling and be great at football. This is a sleeping giant.”
Russo is the 15th coach in Paramus Catholic football history. He came in with Chris Partridge and helped guide the team to consecutive Non-Public Group 4 state titles in the “Livin’” era, then spent a season with Dan Sabella during a 2016 championship run.
After that season, he was hired as the Queen of Peace coach, only to have the North Arlington non-public close the following June. Yet even that provided some valuable program-building experience.
The Paladins need exactly that. They ended this season on a losing streak that has reached 16. Russo had Northern Highlands on a 15-game win streak before it fell to Irvington in last weekend’s North Group 4 regional final.
“One of the things I told the kids is, it’s really hard to build something,” Russo said. “But I’ve done it multiple times now… first time as an assistant. I’ve done it as a head coach, and now I’m doing it again at a place I know. There’s way less of a learning curve here for me than most people.”
“I’m getting older and wiser, so I should be better at it,” he added with a laugh. “Hopefully I can do it quicker, but it takes time, and it takes work, and I’m not afraid of that.”
Greg Tartaglia is a high school sports reporter for NorthJersey.com. For full access to live scores, breaking news and analysis from our Varsity Aces team, subscribe today. To get breaking news directly to your inbox, sign up for our newsletter and download our app.
Email: tartaglia@northjersey.com
Twitter: @njtags13
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Paramus Catholic NJ football hires Greg Russo as new head coach
