Clyde Parry, a former chief of police, will serve as J.P. Taravella’s new football coach and control the sidelines

Coral Springs, Florida – J.P. Taravella High School has appointed former Coral Springs Police Chief Clyde Parry as their new football coach, a move that is guaranteed to cause a stir on the football field.

Parry has exchanged his badge for a playbook and is determined to restore harmony and success to a club that has lost more games than titles in the past few years.

Parry plans to give back to the town where he spent the majority of his life after retiring in 2022.

“It is my hope that we make improvements each year, and as we do, more and more of the talented kids who attend Taravella will come out for the team and help us achieve our goal of winning a district championship,“ said Parry.

Having worked under former J.P. Taravella coach Yapphet Butler in 2023, he has been a Coral Springs Chargers coach for more than 30 years. After attending J.P. Taravella, his younger son proceeded to play football at Florida Tech and the University of South Florida for college.

After serving for a year as a police officer with the Derry Borough Police Department outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Parry moved to South Florida in May of 1987.

Parry “committed himself to learning all he could about narcotics trafficking and drug smuggling” after witnessing firsthand the damage drugs were having on the community early in his tenure with Coral Springs, according to the city’s news statement.

According to the city, Parry’s dedication soon led to him being assigned to the Vice Intelligence and Narcotics Unit of the police department, where he worked for eighteen years.

Parry received a promotion of sergeant in late 2006. 2010 saw him promoted to lieutenant.

The city claims that when house invasions in Coral Springs increased following Parry’s promotion to captain, he created the Burglary Enforcement and Reduction (BEAR) Unit.

“That unit led to great success in preventing home burglaries in our community and became the model for other departments who established similar units,” said Parry in 2022.

Shortly after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School mass shooting on February 14, 2018, Parry received a promotion.

Following the attack, Parry gave his officers’ mental health first priority.

“Early on in my career, I saw how an incident impacted a fellow officer, and later in my career, we lost a detective to suicide,” Parry said in a statement. “I know the violence at MSD impacted so many of our members, and I am proud of how we supported each other during that unthinkable tragedy and how we still support each other today.”

Following his first few weeks as head coach, Parry is pleased with his incoming senior class, which consists of Bryan Herandez, Kile Duquesnay, JaMichael Barnes, Marcus Jean Baptiste, Jaheim Olivieri, and Miles Green. Despite some players leaving the team, these players have remained with it.

“We are blessed to have them, Parry said. “They are all fine young men. I am very happy they chose to stay. I believe they, along with the underclassmen we have, can accomplish more this year than we have done in the last four years.”

Parry believes his team has already made improvements and is pleased with the coaching staff he has.

J.P. Taravella recently concluded a 1–9 season. They have only won one game in the last two years, both of which were against Pompano Beach High School. They are in the midst of their spring practices and will begin the new season with yet another demanding schedule in the fall.
August 23 at 4 p.m. is when they are supposed to play their first game against Hollywood Hills High School.