BECKLEY — Long-time Meadow Bridge basketball coach Ed McCall may be hanging up his coaching whistle, but you can hardly call what he’s doing retiring.

Take the last month for example.

The 63-year-old McCall was a volunteer at the inaugural Greenbrier Classic, where 15 hour days were the norm.

Then, last weekend, he played in the BNI Memorial Golf Tournament.

Now, topping all that, he is going to compete in the Glade Springs Charlie Williamson Memorial Triathlon today at 8 a.m. at The Resort at Glade Springs.

He won’t be bored.

But he will miss the teaching/coaching job.

“I just felt like if I wasn’t going to be involved in the total life of the school, I would give up the coaching job as well,” McCall said. “Maybe it is time to move on and let someone else take the reins. They have a good man in place (assistant Mark Gladwell) and a group of young kids who are hard workers and good basketball players. I hope they continue that.”

McCall was at Meadow Bridge for 31 years — rare in the coaching fraternity these days — and compiled a 422-360 record.

McCall started coaching right out of college, at Walton High in Roane County.

“I think they were taking advantage of a young guy with too much energy,” McCall said of his start in 1973. “I probably coached nine different teams and I was the AD (athletic director). I lived in a trailer that wasn’t much bigger than a camper. I’d go grab a sandwich after school and head right back to open the gym. It was like a YMCA.”

McCall married and his wife ended up getting accepted to the Osteopathic School in Lewisburg.

“At the time my mother remarried and she moved to Beckley and I ended up taking the old homestead in Rainelle,” McCall said.

Of course, he wasn’t coaching.

Instead, he was working on a sewer project.

“I came home one hot August evening and Joe McClung pulled up and said, ‘How’d you like to teach a little English and coach a little football,’” McCall said. “I looked at my muddy boots and it wasn’t much of a choice.”

He has been, along with football coach Larry McClintic, a mainstay at the school.

Both are the longest tenured coaches in their respective sports.

There are more highs for McCall. Mainly highs, in fact.

“Too many to have any favorites,” McCall said. “I’ll tell you a story that happened today. I was working at the Greenbrier (he helps with the golf program at the resort) and a lady got on the bus, limping. I asked her what was wrong and she said it was a knee. I told her my wife just had her meniscus done and it was going good. I asked her who her doctor was and she said Dr. Pack. That was one of my former players.

“That was nice. That is the type of thing you take away from this job. We had good kids, great parental support and good community support. When a kid comes back and tells you that some of the lessons he learned in your classroom or on the court, well, that means something.”

He’s had great teams.

In 1989, the Wildcats were ranked No. 3 behind Pineville and Mount Hope, all teams in the same region. They lost four games, three to Mount Hope by a combined five points. They beat Mount Hope once that year. Pineville ended up winning the region but lost to Bramwell in the state tournament, a team the Wildcats had beaten.

Another one of his teams was involved in what remains the lowest scoring game in state history in the three-point era, when Meadow Bridge beat the Marsh Fork Bulldogs 11-8.

And he has long been a staunch proponent of small school basketball.

“It’ll be hard when the season begins, but you have to move on,” McCall said. “Who knows? I may not be done coaching yet.”

For now, he’s focusing on the triathlon.

“My daughter (Maclyn), a former Wildcat athlete (and now a veterinarian in the Charleston area) has done these before,” McCall said. “She’s been my inspiration and my encouragement. I’ve trained, and I’ve never been really far out of shape.

“I knew Charlie Williamson from school and he was a great guy. Besides, I’ve told too many people that I can’t back out now.”

Is there anything he’s concerned about.

“Well, there is the creepiness of swimming in a lake where you can’t see the bottom,” McCall said. “With people around you crashing and thrashing, that will be an anxious time.

“And I dread the run. I never really like to run unless there was a ball involved. If they let me dribble a basketball, that might help.”

— E-mail: demorrison@register-herald.com