Trio Join Department as Assistant Coaches

Jerome Cook (football – defensive line), Kyle Garase (swimming & diving), and Joseph Pille (men's lacrosse) have been hired as assistant coaches at The College of Wooster. Garase and Pille began their duties at the beginning of August, while Cook officially joins the staff on August 8.

Cook, who has seven years of defensive line coaching experience at the high school level, is joining the college ranks for the first time. He most recently was a defensive line coach at Mooresville High School in Indiana, and prior to that spent three seasons at Lawrence North High School in Indianapolis. Cook's coaching career started at Shortridge High School in Indianapolis, where he spent four seasons. At each of his stops, Cook worked closed on developing his position group's strength, agility, and game skills, improved performance through strategic personal training programs, and advocated for more stretching, mobility work, and proper form to assist high school students in safely increasing their strength.

Cook broke onto the scene at the semiprofessional level with a season as the defensive line coach for the Indianapolis Tornados.

Cook was a member of Lackawanna College's football team and he has a sport management degree from there.

Garase is rejoining the collegiate coaching ranks with the Wooster appointment. Garase previously was an assistant at Div. II Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Div. III Hope College, and Wittenberg University, spending one season with each respective program.

Since leaving Wittenberg, Garase has been active on the club and high school scene. He spent two years as the head age group coach for Peter's Township Swim Club in Pennsylvania and was an assistant within Peter's Township School District's team. In addition, Garase worked as aquatics coordinator at Spencer Family YMCA and has numerous experiences as a camp instructor, including at Kenyon College, Indiana University Bloomington, and Bates College.

In college, Garase earned second-team All-Presidents' Athletic Conference honors as a butterfly specialist at Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. There, Garase helped the program establish new program records in the 200 and 400 medley relays and 800 freestyle relay.

Garase graduated with from St. Vincent with a communications degree.

Pille, who served as the defensive and recruiting coordinator as a graduate assistant at Goucher College, will serve as the   Scots' defensive coordinator, goalkeeper coach, and recruiting coordinator.

At Goucher, a Div. III institution in Maryland, Pille led the development of the defensive scheme, defensive playbook, and the faceoff unit plan. He planned all recruiting visits, designed and implemented analytical breakdown of game film for game-day goals, and created and implemented a year-round strength and conditioning program. Outside of coaching, Pille was a history lecturer at Goucher. 

Pille's coaching career started as an assistant coach at Div. III Alvernia University. He spent the 2018 season assisting Carl Haas with all aspects of the program. Pille then moved on to Div. III Roanoke College, and spent two years as the program's defensive and faceoff coordinator, in addition to mentoring first-years to ensure academic success. He has additional coaching experience with five years of club coaching across Maryland and New Jersey.

As a student-athlete, Pille played for head coach Eric Seideman at Mount Saint Mary College in New York. He appeared in 43 career games as a defender, and finished with 20 groundballs and eight caused turnovers. 

Pille has an undergraduate degree in history and a graduate degree in athletic leadership.