By Rick Assad
Sid Cooke was in his fourth season coaching the Burbank High boys’ basketball team.
Cooke, who led the Bulldogs to the CIF Southern Section Division III semifinals in his second season at the helm, has been relieved of his duties.
The last game Cooke coached was on December 1 against Shalhevet, which was a 69-43 nonleague loss.
Patrick McMenamin is an Athletic Director at Burbank, and he thanked Cooke for his service.
“We appreciate all that Coach Sid has done to help build our boys’ basketball program,” he said. “At this time, we will be going in a different direction.”
During Cooke’s tenure as the Bulldogs’ head man, his teams went 28-38 and 12-16 in the Pacific League and also qualified for the playoffs twice.
In Cooke’s first season, the Bulldogs went 10-17 and 5-9 in the league and the next season finished 10-5 and 5-2 in league play.
“I think we had a nice run in our second season after getting to the Division III state playoffs,” Cooke said. “We had a really good group. I wish the same success moving forward for the Burbank program.”
That team knocked off Montclair 46-44 in the first round and then beat Thousand Oaks 62-56 in the second round.
Burbank took out Foothill 79-73 in the quarterfinals before losing to King 63-51 in the semifinals.
The Bulldogs were invited to the Division III state tournament and fell to La Costa Canyon 72-60 in the opening round.
In Cooke’s third campaign, Burbank cobbled together a 6-11 mark and 2-5 in league action.
Cooke was grateful for the time he spent at Burbank and its players. “I wish everyone well and I wish them all the best of luck,” he said.
Before that, Cooke was the head coach at Renaissance Academy in La Canada for 16 years where his teams went 373-118.
In just a few seasons, Cooke turned that program into a Southern Section powerhouse.
Three of Cooke’s players from Renaissance Academy were named CIF Players of the Year and they were Marquise Mosley, Vince De Guzman and Justin Cook, while another Renaissance Academy player, Jessy Cantinol, won the John R. Wooden Award as the top high school player in Division VI.
During that spectacular run, Cooke was in charge of a program that made the CIF Finals six years while taking away four championships and adding two State Regional titles.
Cooke coached 19 players that were selected All-CIF including Burbank standouts Elmer Reyes, who is playing at La Sierra University in Riverside and Vartan Avetisyan.
