Grattan done at helm of WLN team after 23-8 season

Walled Lake Northern Head Softball Coach Mark Grattan is leaving his post following four years at the helm of the Knights and this year leading Northern to its best season in school history.

Grattan finishes with a record of 317 wins and 218 losses in 15 overall seasons as a head coach. Besides his tenure at Northern, Grattan spent four years as head coach at Walled Lake Western and seven leading the Waterford Mott Corsairs.

He said that focusing on his health is the reason for his retirement from the Northern program.

“I’ve been playing sports for 50 years and I can barely stand during a doubleheader,” he said, adding that he is not leaving his teaching post at Northern, where he teaches classes in U.S. history, the Civil War and America at War.

Grattan said there has been no decision on who will take over as the Knights’ head coach.

Since taking over Northern’s softball program four seasons ago, Grattan’s goal was to turn the upstart Knights into contenders.

In 2009, the Knights finished with a 20-15 record before sharing the Kensington Lakes Activities Association (KLAA) North Division title with neighbor Huron Valley Lakeland in 2010.

But this season, the Knights broke through by sharing the KLAA North title with Lakeland, but also earning the No. 1 seed in the Lakes Conference tournament and going on to win the Lakes Conference and KLAA titles.

Northern would then claim its first Michigan High School Athletic Association (MHSAA) district championship and finish 23-8.

“I’m going to remember this team doing things that hadn’t been done before and all the kids that I coached,” Grattan said.