Metamora is second in the pre–season 5A state football poll.
Central Catholic tied for first in four–a with Driscoll Catholic.
Peoria Notre Dame trying to bounce back from a 2–and–7 season under a brand new head coach.

Tom Gullickson knows winning.
A lineman for the 1973 National Championship team at Notre Dame, he's also won numerous state titles as an assistant at Joliet Catholic.

Notre Dame Sr. Running back Bill O'Brien said, "I've noticed the big ring on his finger and yeah the winning's been there."

Notre Dame Head Coach Tom Gullickson said, "I was always very fortunate and in the last 30 years of coaching I think 27 of those we always won more than we lost."

Taking over a program that hasn't had a winning season since 1999 will be a challenge.
Gullickson says we won't know right away if he's successful.

Gullickson said, "The other day somebody asked we How's your team going to be coach and she was kind of schocked when I told her we won't know for 10 years. And she looked at me like what do you mean 10 years? Well, if we 9 and Oh and in 10 years we find out our kids are not the kind of people we want representing our school then we didn't do our job."

Tom isn't the only athlete in his family. His brother Bill was the 2nd choice in the 1977 Major League Baseball draft and went on to a 14 year career as a pitcher with the Expos, Reds, Yankees, Astros and Tigers.

Gullickson said, "Bill got a big break because I was actually a pitcher and we would go out and he would catch me. Our parents had an old concrete garage behind me. I'd pitch but he could never catch my wild pitches and they would bounce and hit him in the back of the head and he would cry so I said all right crybaby you can pitch and that was the last time I ever got the ball back."