BY NATE KOTISSO | THE MONITOR
Nelly Trevino didn’t look for the PSJA High job, but the job found her.
A Mission High graduate and former first assistant of former Sharyland High coach Dale Whitaker, Trevino applied for the Sharyland Pioneer opening in 2014 and didn’t get the job. Trevino then pivoted back to school herself, going to grad school to earn a master’s degree in school administration.
After earning her master’s degree, Trevino took a teaching job at PSJA High.
“I’d lend a hand to wherever I could sports-wise, but my thought was to go to PSJA (High) and transition into an admin job at some point. That’s what the plan was,” Trevino said.
However, Trevino’s high school coach, Rio Grande Valley Sports Hall of Famer Rene Garza, had been in her ear for more than a decade suggesting that she was destined to be a head coach.
“Coach Garza was a big mentor and advocate for me,” Trevino said. “He’d always tell me, ‘This (coaching) is what you should be doing.’ Ever since I moved back down here, he was adamant about it.”
Trevino is the third PSJA High coach in three seasons, but she has the Bears (15-11) smack dab in the middle of the district standings at 2-2 despite having only one senior in the starting lineup.
“We’re having to rebuild and revise this program that hasn’t had a strong foundation in a long time,” Trevino said. “There’s a lot of change and adapting that the kids have had to do, but we’re working on it. I’m having a blast with them.”