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Sherrington: A coach who hit and missed, Chuck Curtis never backed down from a challenge

Ed Sackett/The Dallas Morning News

UTA head football coach Chuck Curtis walks towards the football field during a rally to show support for the disbanded team on Dec. 5, 1985 at Maverick Stadium in Arlington. (Ed Sackett/The Dallas Morning News)

By the time he'd won three state football titles in a row at a couple of different stops, a Texas high school record for excellence in wanderlust, Chuck Curtis was just 29 and already wondering what to do with the rest of his life.

He'd never been anything but a head coach at Holliday, Jacksboro and Garland, and even though he craved a college job, he wasn't waiting 10 years on someone else's staff.