Yuma High hires football, volleyball and girls hoops coaches

 Yuma High didn't have to look far to fill its head football, volleyball and girls basketball coaching vacancies.

 Tom Fox will lead the Criminals' football program after serving the past three years as an assistant at Arizona Western College. Manny Garcia, who has previously had success coaching volleyball at Cibola, takes over for the retired Charlie Klemp. And Nate Jurgens will attempt to bring stability to Yuma girls basketball. Jurgens was an assistant with the Crims three years ago.

 All three local hires are pending approval by the school board.

 "All three of them are bringing a breath of fresh air," Yuma High athletic director Mike Sharp said. "They're coming in and they're motivated. They're just good people coming in to work with some kids and make them better people. I'm real excited to get started next year. It's going to be a good time."

 Yuma High will be Fox's first venture into coaching high school football. He held positions as a quarterbacks coach, special teams coordinator and offensive coordinator during his tenure at AWC.

 Fox will be on staff, but not on faculty as a teacher.

 "It's a pretty exciting time right now for Yuma, with the 100-year celebration (next year)," Fox said. "It's my first foray into high school. With college, there's a lot of administrative duties and you don't get quite as much of the hands on. The opportunity to be on the Yuma high campus, be around these young men on a daily basis and bond a little more with the community and parents was certainly appealing to me."

 Fox replaces Michael Chadwick, who was let go after one season. The Criminals went 2-8 overall and 2-1 in the Gila Valley Region last year.

 "He's the perfect fit for our program," Sharp said of Fox. "He has the perfect demeanor. The offensive and defensive schemes he wants to run are right in line with the kids that we have. And he's a people person -  dedicated, motivated, the whole bit."

 Fox said Curt Weber will remain the defensive coordinator at Yuma, and he said he will welcome back assistants from last year in addition to a few new hires.

 As a an assistant at AWC who was responsible to help out with recruiting around the state and country, Fox has some familiarity with the prep football scene in Yuma.

 "One thing that really struck me the last three years recruiting in-state has been the level of respect that the programs down here have gotten," Fox said. "People around the state speak of Coach (Lucky) Arvizo and what he's done at Cibola, Coach (Rhett) Stallworth and what he did at Yuma before and what he's doing at Yuma Catholic, so there's a lot of respect for the programs that are run down here - the class they're conducted with and how hard the kids play. I'm excited to be a part of it."

 In Garcia, the Criminals are getting a highly-qualified coach who has been a fixture on the local volleyball scene for almost two decades.

Garcia, who teaches Spanish at Yuma, coached Cibola for 18 years. During his tenure the Raiders won numerous city championships and went on to make postseason appearances on several occasions. He stepped away from coaching for three years to care for his father.

"Whenever I could I watched the sport, so in a way I've been with it," Garcia said of his three-year absence from coaching. "I'm really excited about this new position. It just feels really good to get back into coaching."

Garcia replaces Klemp who retired from teaching and coaching. He spent four years at Yuma and led the Criminals to the Gila Valley championship in his final season on the bench.

 "Charlie did some great things for us. He was a good guy, good coach, he worked them hard and his team's performance on the court proved that," Sharp said. "That's one program that's been pretty stable, along with boy's basketball."

 Jurgens is another local hire and teaches upper-level math and is the Yuma High computer specialist on the faculty. He will be the girl's basketball program's third head coach in three years.

Jurgens once served as a Yuma High assistant for Liz Huyck.

 "Nate will bring stability for us," Sharp said. "I was looking at Nate a long time ago. I offered it to him a couple years ago and it just wasn't right for him. Every time I'd see him I'd keep talking to him and finally we got him."