Last week Chris Brockman, Trojans athletic administrator, made the announcement that Ed Kirkwood would be stepping down as the Trojans track coach.
Brockman said Ed will remain a basketball coach and will take over as the new athletic director.
“I know he is a great coach, but I think I get more bang for my buck with him as AD. He will still work closely with the new head track coach to make sure that job gets done well. He will not just throw the track program aside,” Brockman told the PVT last week.
Ed Kirkwood retired some four years ago and packed his family up for the wide open spaces of Nevada from New Jersey. He coached three sports a year since 1977 and taught as a teacher in New Jersey. To him, retirement meant giving up just the teaching.
“I knew when I was done with teaching. I also knew at that time I wanted to keep coaching. that was always the favorite part of my day. I came out here and I knew I still wanted to coach. I am definitely not there with coaching. I look at the new position as an opportunity. If it doesn’t work out, I would still have the chance to go back. I think this will be cool, and I will get to see all the sports,” Kirkwood explained.
Kirkwood has been coaching at Pahrump Valley High School in three sports since 2010. He was the jump coach for the track team before he became the head track coach. As the head track coach Kirkwood has coached the girls and boys to a league championship apiece. In addition to track, he has coached JV basketball and JV volleyball.
Brockman said Kirkwood would be able to remain coaching JV girls basketball because there are only two sports during the wintertime and this will not interfere too much with his duties as athletic director.
For Kirkwood, leaving his head track coaching position was a tough decision.
“It was a very difficult decision to leave as head track coach,” he explained. “It was hard because you can’t be a head coach, but it was something I always wanted to do. I still love coaching. The opportunity came up and I was asked to think about it. I look at it as the next step. I have been doing this since 1977. It has been 37 to 38 years I have been coaching. I have been doing three sports a year for every one of those years. That’s 110 straight seasons. Not to mention all the things I usually do during the summer. I usually did camps.”
Kirkwood is embracing the new position as a sports lover’s dream. He said now he can go and see all the sports at the high school play. As a coach he never had the time to see a soccer and football game and now he can.
“I have come to a few football games and I would hide behind the fence,” Kirkwood said. “I have never seen a boys soccer game, but one and I have seen only one girls soccer game because I have always been tied up with volleyball. Even though I have coached different sports. This gives me the chance to be active in all the sports. In some ways, obviously not in coaching. I can do things to help those coaches in all the sports.”