St. John’s High School football coach retires after 19 seasons

By Bill Doyle
The only practice John Andreoli remembers missing in his 19 years as head varsity football coach at St. John’s High School in Shrewsbury was the day he traveled to Fenway Park to watch his son, John Jr., play left field for the Baltimore Orioles against the Red Sox in 2018.
His assistant coaches convinced him it would be OK if he went. He never missed a St. John’s game, however.
“I missed a lot of weddings, but I didn’t miss any games,” he said. “My wife (Karen) was a saint going to those weddings by herself sometimes.”
Mr. Andreoli will be able to attend as many weddings as he wants now because in early December he announced his retirement as St. John’s football coach.
As president and CEO of the Sullivan Insurance Group in Worcester, Mr. Andreoli would arrive at the office early each fall so he could be on the practice field with the Pioneers at 3 p.m. Whatever insurance business was left to do that day, he finished at night. Those long days have now ended.    
“I’m 63,” he said. “I’ve done this for 19 years, my business has grown considerably since I started with football. I think for me it was just time, it was the right time. I love football and I love being part of it and I’m going to miss it terribly, but you only have so many hours in the day.”
In addition to his insurance business, he serves on the board of directors for Unibank and for Salmon Health and Retirement.
Mr. Andreoli, a 1978 St. John’s graduate, posted the most victories of any football coach at his alma mater. His Pioneers went 156-64 for a .709 winning percentage. They won five Super Bowls (2004, 2005, 2006, 2009, 2010) and in 2017 they captured the Division 3 state championship by defeating North Attleborough, 35-32, at Gillette Stadium. The 2017 team finished 13-0 and set school records for victories and points with 588, 12 shy of Everett High’s state record.
“That was a very special team,” he said, “not because they were the most talented, but because I thought they played well together in all three phases of the game. They were very complementary. Every team was different and they were all very special.”
The games weren’t his favorite part of coaching. Practice was.    
“At the end of the day, you’re teaching kids how to fall in love with the process of being great,” he said, “and that means doing the little things right all the time.”
The Pioneers were also Super Bowl or state runners-up in 2011, 2012 and 2013.
Headmaster Alex Zequeira said, “I am grateful for Coach Andreoli’s service to his alma mater, a football program where he found great success as a Pioneer player and coach and for consistently representing St. John’s High School with the highest levels of sportsmanship, integrity, and class.”
Mr. Andreoli attended Worcester Public Schools through the eighth grade, but his mother, Anne Marie, wanted him to go to St. John’s High School because her father and brothers had graduated from there.
Mr. Andreoli was inducted into the St. John’s Athletic Hall of Fame as a player (football, baseball and golf) and coach in 2021. He was inducted into the College of the Holy Cross Varsity Club Hall of Fame 20 years earlier.
The Xaverian Brothers at St. John’s and the Jesuits at Holy Cross taught him to help others, and his father-in-law, Fran O’Brien, reinforced that philosophy when St. John’s hired Mr. Andreoli in 2004.
“He told me a long time ago,” Mr. Andreoli recalled, “‘Always give back to the game that gave you so much, and the people in it.’ I’m so glad I heeded his advice because it really made for a wonderful 19 years for me.”
After graduating from HC in 1982, Mr. Andreoli served as a graduate assistant for the Crusaders that fall under head coach Rick Carter. He put his coaching career on hold to play linebacker in the United States Football League in the spring for the Boston Breakers in 1983 and for the New Orleans Breakers in 1984, and he spent the 1983 fall season on injured reserve with the New England Patriots. Then he entered the insurance business, but he found time to coach his son John Jr. for four years in youth football in Shrewsbury.
When his son was about to enter St. John’s as a freshman in 2004, Tony Wood had retired as head varsity football coach and Mr. Andreoli applied for the job.
“(Headmaster) Mike Welch took a chance on me and (athletic director) Bobby Foley took a chance on me,” Mr. Andreoli said, “and I’m glad they did and I was glad to be able to have the career that I did at St. John’s.”
Mr. Andreoli plans to attend as many St. John’s games as he can next season.
One of his best St. John’s memories was having his father, Arthur, serve as an honorary captain at a game during the last few months of his life in 2014.
“To be able to bring him out for the coin toss,” Mr. Andreoli said, “I was just thrilled with that. That was a great memory for me. He was a great mentor to me.”
Mr. Andreoli’s nephew, Bobby Spellane, wheeled his grandfather onto the field for the coin toss.
Arthur was a Catholic Digest All-American basketball player for the College of the Holy Cross in 1958 and was inducted into the HC Varsity Club Hall of Fame in 2009.