Longtime West football coach Ed Gurule has been fired.
A physical education teacher at West who has headed the Denver Prep League’s Cowboys since 1990, Gurule said he was told by school administration to make the choice of resigning or being removed.
He chose the latter.
“Anybody who knows me knows I’m not a quitter,” said Gurule, 51.
West officials were unable to be reached for comment.
The Class 4A Cowboys, who dropped from 5A in a two-year realignment that included a new city league for the first time since 1991, were winless (0-10) in 2006 and shut out four times.
Overall, Gurule’s teams were 51-120 with one playoff appearance (in 1995, when the Cowboys were 8-3 in 5A) and two winning records (the other was 6-4 in 1991 in 6A).
However, for decades West has drawn from an area virtually devoid of football experience – Adrian Perez, 1995, has been Gurule’s only All-Colorado or all-state player in listings by The Denver Post – and suffered through a similar city plague of poor turnout, smaller players and insufficient youth offerings. Gurule also said the Cowboys usually kept their inner core together and West didn’t have discipline or academic problems, unlike some other Denver programs.
Gurule, who began as a West assistant in 1989, was second to George Washington’s Steve Finesilver (22 years) in active head coaching tenure at one DPL school.
Of nine city high schools that field football – Manual temporarily closed last spring and did not have a 2006 team – John F. Kennedy’s Chris Enzminger is next with six years. South finished the regular season with a third head coach; Thomas Jefferson has had three since the end of the 2005 season; Montbello had to replace its coach after the second game this season following a resignation; and East, Abraham Lincoln and North each began 2006 with new coaches.
