Girls basketball: Burlington Central’s Collin Kalamatas resigns after 4 seasons

After leading Burlington Central to its third straight regional championship last month, Rockets coach Collin Kalamatas announced Monday that he was resigning after four seasons.

Kalamatas informed Central athletic director Ted Juske last week and told his players Thursday. Kalamatas, a physical education teacher at Huntley, will continue his position as Huntley’s boys golf coach in the fall.

Kalamatas said he wanted to spend more time with his family, and working in two districts no longer made that possible. Calvin, his 6-year old son, is starting to get into basketball and soccer. Kalamatas also has a 3-year-old daughter, Addy.

“I just felt like the timing was right,” Kalamatas said. “Coaching and teaching at two districts has some pretty unique challenges. Over the years, it got harder and harder. It just felt like it was time to step way and give somebody else a chance to lead.

“My kids are at an age where I’m going to get more involved with coaching them, and it would be hard to pour all of my time and effort into the job and at the same time still do all the stuff I want to do at home.”

Kalamatas led Central to an 87-28 record in four years and three consecutive regional championships, not counting the COVID-19-shortened season in 2021 in which an IHSA state series was not held because of the pandemic. That season, the Rockets went 13-2 and won both the Fox Valley Conference regular-season and tournament titles.

Kalamatas, a 2005 Huntley graduate, coached Woodstock’s girls basketball team for a year before taking the Rockets’ job before the start of the 2019-20 season. In his first year, the Rockets won a program-record 29 games.

Kalamatas said, more than the wins, he was most proud about the relationships he made during his time at Central. Every year at the end of Central’s summer camp, Rockets alumni regularly return and play shooting games with current players.

“There are still kids that I text from that first year,” he said. “Kat Schmidt, or every once in a while Zoey Kollhoff, who is playing soccer at the University of Illinois. We’ll somehow cross paths and text each other. It’s really cool that I’ve been able to impact some kids in that way. And they’ve all had a huge impact on my life.”

Kalamatas said the Rockets’ most recent regional title – a 42-32 victory over Boylan at home – was the most satisfying, although all three were memorable. Central then almost upset Montini in its next game, losing a lead late and falling 44-41 in the Class 3A sectional semifinals.

Central finished 22-11 and tied for third in the FVC at 12-6 after some early-season struggles.

“It just all kind of came together at the right time,” Kalamatas said. “The girls trusted and believed in each other. It was a goal they really wanted really bad, and so did we as a coaching staff. Winning those three regional championships was a dream. My time [at Central] has been very memorable. There are lots of good people that I was very happy to get to know.”