Afterย Vern Friedliย retired from coaching Amphitheater High Schoolโs football team in 2010, his state record 331 career victories โ achieved at Morenci, Casa Grande, San Manuel and Amphi โ were immediately challenged.
Lakeside Blue Ridge coachย Paul Moro, who won 13 state championships at a small-school classification in the White Mountains, seemed sure to hit 331 and beyond. Sure enough, last October, in his first year at Tempe Marcos de Niza, Moro won game No. 332.
But the biggest challenges to Friedliโs monumental victory total came not from Moro, but from Phoenix-area coaching legendsย Jesse Parkerย of Mesa Mountain View andย Karl Kieferย of Tempe McClintock.
Kiefer retired with 302; Parker with 309.
Incredibly, Parker died Friday in Phoenix at 77, about 12 hours after Friedli, 80, died in Tucson.
The rivalry between Friedli and the two Phoenix-area coaching giants was civil, but that was about it. Friedli once told me that coaching one of those Phoenix โsuper schoolsโ was like putting the football teams at Amphi and Canyon del Oro together.
Friedli did more with less, no doubt.
During Friedliโs prime years at Amphi, he became part of a no-love-lost rivalry withย Jeff Scurranโs powerful Sabino program; Scurran won three state titles. For about 10 years, beginning in the late โ80s, the Sabino-Amphi game was a โcanโt missโ occasion.
โI really didnโt get to know Vern,โ Scurran, 70, said Saturday as he prepared to open Catalina Foothillsโ training camp in Flagstaff. โOur longest conversations were those small-talk sessions weโd have on the field just before kickoff.
โBut I was always respectful of his career and the young menโs lives he impacted. I know he was a good man.โ
