Greg Castillo, who has served as the Loyola volleyball coach for the last seven years, resigned Monday after accepting an offer to hold the same position at Xavier University.

“He came in on Monday, handed me his letter of resignation and said that Xavier had offered him a salary that he couldn’t turn down,” said Loyola athletic director Jerry Hernandez.

Castillo’s resignation marks the second time in three months that Loyola has lost one of the most successful coaches in its history.

Paul Garvey stepped down as Loyola’s track and cross country coach in January, just a month after he had taken the cross country team to the national tournament.

In addition to the increase in pay, Castillo said the Xavier job offers him a couple things Loyola couldn’t.

“It’s going to be a brand new program at Xavier, so I can lay the foundation, so hopefully I can continue to do what I’ve done at Loyola,” he said. “Plus, I’ll be able to give out scholarships.”

Unlike most other universities, Loyola does not offer athletic scholarships.

“I’m sure that [scholarships] probably was an issue with Coach,” Hernandez said. “Now he can offer people scholarships to go there and not have to beat his head against the wall like we all do trying to get people to come here, especially now with the tuition going up to $21,300.”

In a meeting on Tuesday, Castillo informed his players about his resignation.

According to communications junior Amanda Gilliard, the announcement came as a shock.

“He had been fine at all our practices; he was joking around us and just acting normal.

“I think this all hit us at once. I guess there were mixed emotions. A lot of people were pretty upset, some were really mad. I personally was upset, but not really at Greg; he did what he needed to do.”

Castillo said he is leaving with a heavy heart.

“The players are what I’m really going to miss,” he said. “I don’t care what anybody says, but you form a relationship with your players. They know I care about them, and that I’ll do anything I can to help them out.”

The players share a mutual feeling.

“Greg was like a different kind of coach,” said Gilliard, who will be one of three returning seniors next season. “There are a lot of people who can’t stand their coaches, but he’s just a very easy person to get along with. He was like our Dad, I guess.”

Castillo leaves Loyola with a career record of 149-94, including 64-23 the past two seasons. He led the team to the past four GCAC championships and two straight national tournament appearances.

According to Gilliard, that winning tradition will be tough to replace.

“It’s going to be hard to find someone better than Greg,” she said. “That’s going to be a lot of pressure on us to find someone like that, someone who can teach and coach the freshmen and sophomores the way Greg did for us.”

Hernandez hopes to replace Castillo as quickly as possible.

“There are some people locally that have been successful at the high school level, and of course that’s where [Castillo] came from,” he said.

Castillo’s departure to start a volleyball program at Xavier sets up two matches between Castillo and his former team next year, as Xavier is also in the GCAC.

“It’s going to be some tough feelings that I’m going to have to control, but it should be fun,” Castillo said. “Hopefully we can all shake hands and hug afterward. That’s going to be the toughest thing.”

(Charles Costello)

(Charles Costello )