Everett High School hires new head football coach

The Everett High School football team has found its next head coach.

Everett School District athletics director Robert Polk announced Friday that longtime Seagulls boys wrestling coach and Everett School District teacher Brien Elliott will take over the position left vacant after the resignation of former head coach David Coldiron earlier this month.

“I saw an opportunity to help out and try and create a positive culture in football at Everett,” Elliott said. “I really am excited about the challenge.”

Elliott will be the third coach in as many seasons for an Everett program coming off a 1-8 campaign in 2018, including a 1-5 mark in Wesco 3A South play.

“Having someone that has been in Everett that understands the kids, understands the community, understands the challenges and maybe has an idea of how to approach that and work through the adversity and challenges that could come up,” Elliot said. “I think that that’s real important. Being in Everett and working with these students and knowing these students, it’s a lot easier to motivate them.”

The 1985 Everett graduate became an assistant coach on the wrestling team in 1987. He said he took over as head coach in 2003 or 2004.

Elliott has also spent the past 25 years coaching football at the high school, middle school and junior college levels — most recently leading Evergreen Middle School’s eighth-grade squad last fall.

“Brien has high expectations for his student athletes,” Polk said in a press release. “When watching a wrestling practice, it is not uncommon to see athletes sitting at a desk doing homework instead of practicing because they did not take care of their academic priority first.”

Elliott said he plans to fill out his coaching staff with candidates that have local ties to the high school and the city of Everett, just as he has for the wrestling team, which he will continue to coach.

“I care a lot about the school,” Elliott said. “It was a real important place for me in my life. It made me who I am today, and I want to be able to do that for the students at Everett High School — give them an opportunity to have mentors there that care about them and impact their life for the better.

“I really think that coaches play a big part in helping student-athletes make decisions, and I want to have that opportunity.”