Jim Tsilimos resigned as Wellsville’s head football coach after one season. (Salem News/Lowell Spencer)

WELLSVILLE — After spending the last three weeks in Florida, Jim Tsilimos decided it was time for a change.

Tsilimos — who was inducted into the Ohio High School Football Coaches Hall of Fame in June — told Wellsville High School he is resigning as head football coach.

“I am 72 years old and I’m tired of coaching right now,” he said. “We had everything set up to go (for next season). We came down for Thanksgiving and have been here for three weeks.”

Tsilimos said after Wellsville’s 0-10 season he was coming back next year, but that changed after time enjoying the Florida weather.

“We talked about it a couple of weeks ago (with Wellsville athletic director Kyle Exline) and he told me to think about it,” Tsilimos said. “At first I thought I’d go back. The more I thought about it, there’s guys on the staff who can take over.

“It was nothing anyone did there. I felt I needed a break and needed to do something else.”

A release from the district said “Wellsville High School thanks Coach Tsilimos for his service, dedication, and professionalism, and wishes him and his family the very best moving forward. The school will begin the process of identifying the next coach football coach in the coming months.”

Tsilimos has 50 years of coaching experience, including 35 as a head coach with 205 career victories. He is best known for leading Lisbon to the 1995 Ohio Division V state championship — the only one in Columbiana County history.

He is Lisbon’s winningest football coach at 147-115 in 25 seasons leading the Blue Devils — including 110-79 from 1990-2007 and 37-36 from 2011-2017 — with six league titles and eight state playoff appearances.

Then Tsilimos went 30-24 in five seasons as Carrollton’s head coach.

He was Lisbon’s offensive coordinator in 2024 before returning to the head coaching ranks in February as head coach at Lowellville. He resigned that position after six weeks citing personal reasons and then the Wellsville job came open.

Tsilimos often joked he was “waiting for the Browns to call me,” but now feels nothing could get him to return to coaching.

“It would take a lot,” he said. “I’m not looking and I don’t have any feelers out there.”

For now, he is making plans for the new year in 2026 without football.

“I think the last time I wasn’t doing football in the summer was 1972 (before his freshman year at Mount Union College),” Tsilimos said.