Grown-up Ramblers have their eyes on the big prize

John Holecek is both Loyola Academy’s old head football coach and new head football coach, and he hopes to pick up in 2026 where he left off in 2022 when the Ramblers won the IHSA Class 8A championship.

Following that championship season the coach — who is the Ramblers’ all-time leader in victories with 185 and has won four state titles since taking command in 2006 — announced his retirement, but it proved to be short lived. Following a year off he returned as an assistant coach in 2024 and 2025.

Beau Desherow — who moved up from an assistant coach to succeed Holecek and took the Class 8A titles the next two years for a three-peat before last season’s out-of-character 4-5 season and opening round playoff loss — is returning to his old role as one of Holecek’s assistants and a new role as the team’s general manager.

“We were able to creatively figure out a way to keep two great leaders in the program and just sort of reposition people into different roles with many overlapping responsibilities,” Loyola’s Vice President for Athletics Genevieve Atwood said.

Last season the Ramblers were exceptionally young with four sophomores (quarterback Matthew Lee, running backs Melo Maldonado and Jordan Taylor and wide receiver Jordan McKinley) playing major roles along with five juniors (wide receiver Joe Haughey, tight end Brendan Fitzgerald, right cornerback Wes Gundlach, linebacker Will Mettee and strong safety Dom Maloney).

“Dom is getting a Ph.d in football,” Holecek said, referring to Maloney’s previous two varsity seasons as a quarterback. “He’s showing great ability at strong safety (during summer rehearsals).”

Maloney began last season as the starting quarterback but was injured in the fourth quarter of the season-opening triumph at Merrillville (Ind.).

Lee was the catalyst in that victory and started all of the remaining regular season games before Maloney, who was the backup after returning from the injury, got the starting job back in the opening round of the playoffs and almost engineered an upset. He completed 15 of 28 passes for 177 yards and a touchdown and ran 12 times for 67 yards in the 21-17 road loss to the eventual undefeated Class 8A state champion Mount Carmel.

Lee, meanwhile, finished the season with more than 1,000 passing yards, 12 touchdowns and a pair of two-point conversions.

“After a down year with a really young team, this should be a great year,” predicted Lee, who grew during the offseason and now stands 6-foot-4, weighting 205 pounds. “We have a new offensive coordinator and a whole new offense.”

The new offensive coordinator and quarterback coach is Danny Schaechter. He comes from Libertyville High School, where he held the same position, and earlier was the offensive coordinator at Gonzaga College Prep in Washington, D.C., where one of his pupils was Chicago Bears current star quarterback Caleb Williams.

“It’s a crash course in learning his offense,” Holecek said. “For everybody coming back, including myself, it’s like learning a new language.”

For Haughey the main difference in the new offense is that “the receivers have a lot more options where we can change our routes based on what the defensive back is doing—we have a lot more freedom in our routes.”

The 6-3, 215-pound McKinley also figures to again play a huge role on offense.

“My main goal as an individual is to get faster and improve my footwork and my agility,” he said. “I want our team to build on what we did last year when we had a lot of sophomores and juniors and win the state championship.”

The diminutive speedster Maldonado is expected to spearhead the running attack again this season.

“We had a long offseason and did a lot work,” said the younger brother of Marco Maldonado, who set Loyola’s single game rushing record in 38 carries when he amassed 335 yards and scored four touchdowns and a two-point conversion in leading the Ramblers to a 46-43 victory at Brother Rice in the fourth game of the 2021 fall season.

But in the final minute of that game, he suffered a broken collarbone that ended his high school career. Marco Maldonado went on to play at Colgate, from where he just graduated.

Melo Maldonado, who has put in the work this offseason, is up next.

“He has one more year of eligibility and is undecided about what he wants to do with football,” he said. “Our family is proud of him and now I’m trying to make him and the rest of my family proud of me.

“Knowing I’m a smaller back I put on from 10 to 15 pounds in the offseason, and now I’m up to around 170. My hope is to get faster and stronger and succeed in getting back to the state championship game and winning it.”

Gundlach is another player who gained weight during the offseason.

“Last year I was 170 and now I’m 187,” said the right cornerback. “It’s definitely going to help when I’m on the field. I did a lot of weight lifting, running and wind performance drills and got lot of specific cornerback help. I’m looking to be a lot more physical this year.

“Our defense is coming together. I believe in this team. We’re hoping to do big things.”

Holecek believes junior lineman Brendan McHugh, senior linebackers Mark Atwood and Winston Ericson, and junior linebacker Barrett Schiffendecker have what it takes to emerge as conspicuous contributors on defense.

“We have weapons on defense,” Holecek said. “Atwood and Schiffendecker on the outside are great physical specimens who can run. Atwood should be a highly recruited player by major colleges.”

The strongmen on the offensive line are a pair of junior incumbents, CJ Nielson and Brock Thompson.

Holecek prefers to employ independent offensive and defensive units but plans to use the 6-4, 305-pound Thompson “a little on defense” because “we don’t have a lot of good defensive linemen.”

Zac Zeman, a paragon of reliability on extra points, field goals, kickoffs and punts for the past two seasons, has graduated but Holecek is confident that Ryan Edwards, “who is a recruited kicker,” has the ability to fill his shoes.

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