East Grand Rapids has found their guy. After a month-long search, the Pioneers selected Josh Shattuck as the next head coach of their storied football program. Shattuck, previously the head coach at Elkhart High School in Elkhart, Indiana, will be tasked with leading a team who had an uncharacteristically rough 2021 season, finishing with a 3-6 record. 

For Shattuck, the decision to come to East Grand Rapids was two-fold. 

“Personally, I’m from West Michigan,” Shattuck, a Spring Lake native said. “This allowed me and my family to get closer to home.” Professionally, Shattuck explained how he could not pass up on the opportunity.

“The opportunity to coach for East Grand Rapids is unbelievable,” Shattuck said, “it was just a perfect combination of personal and professional which is what everyone strives for.”

The East offense looked stagnant at times last season, and Shattuck looks to bring a new philosophy to get the program back to their winning ways. 

“We want to be multiple. Our biggest thing is that we don’t necessarily want to be balanced in terms of 50% run and pass, we want to be able to throw the ball every down and run the ball every down,” Shattuck said. “We want to be able to win a game by passing it 40 times and we want to be able to win a game by running it 80 times.” Shattuck bases his coaching philosophy on his five core values, a philosophy that comes with an acronym, T.O.R.C.H. 

“Tradition, order, reliability, character, and heart and I think my goals for the program are  that I’m able to articulate those to our staff and then our staff, along with myself, are able to articulate that to the players and carry that as we move towards the season.” Shattuck said. While it is easy to get caught up in wins and losses, EGR’s man-in-charge knows the importance of trusting the process.

“[Wins] are a byproduct of doing the things that I think are important,” Shattuck said. 

Football players are not going to be the only students getting to know Coach Shattuck, he will be serving double-duty as a member of the high school faculty, similar to his predecessor, Coach Longo. He will be teaching in the social studies department, and will also be working on student activities and youth programs.  

“I’m excited to be ingrained in the community, and this job will help to expose me to [all of East Grand Rapids], in a good way,” Shattuck said.

With Coach Shattuck at the helm, it is bound to be an exciting season for East Grand Rapids football.

“They always say make the big time where you are, and we’re going to make it big time here,” Shattuck said.