CHAFFEE COACHING STAFF UNDERGOES SPRING CLEANING

There has been an upheaval in the coaching staff at Chaffee High School.

During last Thursday's March meeting of the Chaffee School Board, the head coaches of four of the school's major sports -- football, boys basketball, girls basketball and baseball -- were not rehired for next school year.

While the football team and both basketball squads have struggled over the past several years, the baseball program has thrived, making it one of the few successful teams at a school that has had trouble competing in most sports over the past decade or more.

Robert Dooley, Chaffee School Board president, said he and his fellow board members are trying to improve Chaffee's overall athletic program -- and thus its overall image in the area.

"We want to improve the overall quality of our sports program," he said. "It right now reflects the attitude of a school system in decline and that's not what is happening in Chaffee.

"We feel there are people in the system who will help us improve the public perception, but we also feel we will have to go outside the system for some help. We have had some people from the area with impressive credentials that have expressed interest in coming to Chaffee. We will continue the search until we find the people we feel can provide us with the head coaching experience that the members of our community and the students of our school system deserve."

Those not rehired to continue as head coaches in their respective sports for next season were Jim Stoverink with boys basketball, Paulette Crouthers with girls basketball, Brian Horrell with football and Bruce Qualls with baseball.

Dooley said that Stoverink and Crouthers both had basically indicated previously that they did not wish to retain their basketball coaching positions. Crouthers was rehired as volleyball coach while Horrell was rehired as an assistant football and baseball coach. Dooley left open the possibility that Horrell could return as head football coach.

"We're very interested in keeping Brian Horrell in the system because we like what he has done," said Dooley. "He has been appointed as a football and baseball coach, but there has been no head coach assigned to those sports, so it still could be him."

Dooley said that Crouthers, Horrell and Qualls will remain with the school system as teachers while Stoverink was not rehired as a teacher.

"We're involved in a coaching search right now," Dooley said. "We have some retirements in the system this year that will allow us to seek some coaching positions."

Qualls, who will coach the baseball team during the 1999 season that begins soon, was not rehired despite an impressive 84-57 record in eight years at the school, including a 15-6 mark last season.

Horrell, a Chaffee graduate, became head coach of the Red Devils' football program in 1996 after previously serving as an assistant. His three-year record is 3-25, including a 1-9 mark last season.

Chaffee's football program had been struggling prior to Horrell.

The Red Devils' last winning season on the gridiron was in 1990 when former coach Mick Wessel directed a 6-4 squad. Wessel led Chaffee to a state title in 1983, but the Red Devils have had just two winning seasons in the last 14 years and their record since 1990 is 12-65.

Horrell said he was out of school Friday and hadn't received official word from anybody about the school board's decisions, although he had heard bits and pieces from various people.

"I haven't been around to hear anything from anybody in charge, so I really don't want to say a whole lot until I have all the facts," he said.

Of the football program's struggles under his direction, Horrell said simply, "Any time you don't win it's frustrating."

Like the football program, the boys basketball program has also suffered through a long string of futility, with the last winning record coming in the early 1980s.

Stoverink recently completed his third season at Chaffee as the Red Devils went 1-20. His three-year record at the school is 7-57, having gone 4-17 his first season and 2-20 last year.

Stoverink, citing his frustration with the program's lack of success, said, "I had told the administration that if the school board didn't want to rehire me, I didn't have a problem with that. If they had wanted me to do it again, I would have kept doing it, but I really didn't want it.

"If the program had started to show some success, I think I would have wanted to keep coaching...I've been getting real frustrated with it...I don't know what else I could have done. I put in a tremendous amount of time, especially in the summer. I opened the gym three days a week and told the kids I would do it more. But there just wasn't any interest. One or two kids would show up."

Added Stoverink, "I know I'm not the best basketball coach, but I don't think I'm a bad coach. The program just won't get better until the kids really put the extra time in over the summer."

Stoverink said he was upset that he was not rehired as a social studies teacher.

"I wanted to come back as a teacher. That completely floored me, it shocked me, that they did not want me back as a teacher. I think I'm a good teacher," he said.

The girls basketball team has also struggled over the years, although Crouthers, after an initial season of 3-18 last year, led the Lady Red Devils to a 10-13 record this past season, marking one of their best performances in a while.

Crouthers said she did not wish to keep coaching basketball as long as she could continue with the volleyball program.

"I'm happy coaching volleyball," she said. "I didn't want to coach basketball any more."