Coaching Staff

This is Coach Palazzolo's second year as the Head Coach of the Cougars.

 

Palazzolo, a native of Medford, OR, has football in his blood. His father, Jim, was a small college head football coach for 20 years. Palazzolo grew up a student of the game and attended South Medford High where he was all-league in football and baseball. A two year starter at QB for the Panthers, he threw for 3,002 yards and 31 TD's his senior year to lead the state of Oregon in passing. He received all-state honors and was voted a captain for the South Team in the Les Schwab Bowl.

Palazzolo was a journeyman college quarterback starting games at four different schools (California Lutheran, Pacific Lutheran, Southern Oregon, Hastings College) before eventually graduating from the University of Oregon with a degree in Sociology and Human Communication.

 

After graduation, Palazzolo traveled across the pond, to Europe, where he played in Germany, Italy, and France. He lead the Pessac Kang's to the French National Championship. The Kang's lost the game 21-20. Palazzolo was named Import of the Year and still holds the French League's record for most touchdown passes in a game (eight). Palazzolo went back to Europe on a two-game contract in the Czech republic in 2019 and played QB for the Ostrava Steelers.

 

Upon returning to the states, Palazzolo spent two years working at Nike World Headquarters in Beaverton, OR. He served as a marketing specialist where he focused on content creation and NFL/College athlete relationships.

 

During this time, Palazzolo also served as the offensive coordinator at Westview High School. While Palazzolo was coordinating the offense for the Wild Cats, they finished in the top five in the state in passing, points scored, and total offense.

 

A job with Blue Star Sports and the Dallas Cowboys brought Palazzolo to the Lonestar State but the career move meant he could not coach football. After one fall away from the game, Palazzolo knew he had to get back to coaching. That's when he put his name in the hat to be the next head coach at Northland Christian.

 

Coach Palazzolo's staff is filled with energy, optimism, and accountability and has brought consistency, experience, and a renewed sense of pride to Cougar Football.

DaQueta Johnson is going into her 5th season with Northland Christian, taking 2nd place in District, advancing to second round playoffs in 2018. Entering into my 17th year of training and/or coaching travel ball fastpitch and have been inspirational in helping many softball players in the past years develop into top collegiate softball players at D1, D2, NAIA and community college level of play. She has coached numerous ASA travel ball teams that have competed at an elite level. In 2002, Coach D played for Team USA, Shanghai China to represent the United States Women’s Softball team.

Coach D's vision is to expose young student-athletes to a sound structured coaching environment that will ultimately guide them to achieve higher skill levels and better knowledge of the game. It all begins with stressing the importance of academics as it relates to competitive sports and to the success in their personal future endeavors through life.

Coach D, played her collegiate softball at Purdue University, from 2003-2006, setting several records over the years. Tied school single-game record for home runs with two against Dayton, Feb. 22, 2004, tied single-game RBI record with seven hits. Ranks among the career top five in three categories: home runs (2nd with 25), RBI (3rd with 118) and slugging percentage (5th with .483) Ranks among the single season top five in home runs (4th with 10, 2006) and RBI (3rd with 46, 2006) Owns spots among the single-season lists for sacrifice flies (2nd with 5) and RBI (3rd with 44).

Dwayne Johnson who has also coached out of southern California, for over 20 plus years. With such programs as, Flash D’ Gold and California Lite 18Gold, Texas lite 12u, 14u, 16u and 18gold, Impactgold18, Texas Intensity and now STX TFS 18gold. Coach DJ has been working hard over the past years to provide opportunities for female scholar athletes who have a desire to play softball at the collegiate level.

 

My Vision for a solid softball program is to expose female athletes to a sound structured coaching environment, which will ultimately help them achieve a higher skill level and a better knowledge of the game.

 

The game of softball will stress the importance of academics as it relates to competitive sports. To also give a solid foundation to enjoy success in their future endeavors and in life. All players must maintain certain standards of academics in order to play and must exhibit the effectiveness of “teamwork “through good attitude, effort, desire, heart and hustle.

 

Coach DJ, over the last several years, has run or assisted in building solid 18g, 16u, 14u and 12u teams for several programs. All teams have been trained in the same manner, as the older 18u team in order to build consistency, throughout the programs. This stability and consistency combined with the experienced coaching provides players with the best possible opportunity for collegiate softball exposure.

***Coach Dwayne “DJ” Johnson was also selected as one of the top fifty coaches designated as an Adidas Futures top coaches for two seasons. Finishing in the top 5 of 50 teams from across the Nation. Coach Dj has been asked to coach in Italy.