PCC softball

Pima College softball coach Armando Quiroz, talking with MaryAlys Julian during a game earlier this season, is approaching career win No. 500 β€” and knee-replacement surgery.

Hall of Fame coaches Armando Quiroz and Rich Alday have retired from coaching at Pima College.Β 

QuirozΒ won exactly 500 softball games from 2008-18 at PCC. Alday won 517 games at Pima in two terms, from 1974-89 and in 2018, after he returned to PCC.

Both men are in the Pima County Sports Hall of Fame.

Quiroz coached Flowing Wells High School to state championships in 1999, 2000 and 2002.

Alday, a former Tucson High School state championship quarterback, won five ACCAC baseballΒ championships at PCC and then spent almost 20 years as the head coach of the New Mexico Lobos.

Quiroz missed the last few weeks of the 2018 softball season to have knee replacement surgery. The Aztecs went 35-23. They finished No. 3 in the NJCAA finals in 2013. Quiroz's daughter, Rebekah, is an Aztecs assistant coach.

Aztecs head coach Rich Alday won 517 games at Pima.

Alday was 21-31 in his second term as Pima's baseball coach. He also coached softball at Ironwood Ridge.Β 

Both moves appear to unrelated to Pima's decision to cut its athletic budget starting in 2019. The school announced last week that it would be cutting football and either golf or tennis in order to reach its new budget figure.Β 


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Contact sports columnist Greg Hansen at 520-573-4362 or ghansen@tucson.com. On Twitter: @ghansen711