Camden Catholic's Brooks steps down

Gil Brooks said he knew it during the football season.

"I found myself wrestling with it," Brooks said of the twin demands of his profession as an attorney with a South Jersey firm and his passion as a high school football coach.

Brooks said he finally concluded that he couldn't continue to make the commitment to both. So he has resigned as football coach at Camden Catholic.

"It just got to be too much," Brooks said Friday afternoon. "I really battled with it all season long. I'm lucky enough to be busy at work, and it just became too much of a time commitment to try to do both."

Brooks is an attorney at Duane Morris LLP in Cherry Hill.

Brooks was 17-5 in two seasons as Camden Catholic's head coach. He led the Irish to a 10-1 record and the Non-Public 2 state final in 2011.

Camden Catholic was 7-4 this season and reached the Non-Public 3 state semifinals.

Brooks was Camden Catholic's defensive coordinator in 2010 under Rick Brown, who is now the offensive coordinator at Eastern.

Before that, Brooks spent 18 years as a highly successful coach at St. Joseph's Prep in Philadelphia.

"The administration was great. The kids were great," Brooks said of Camden Catholic. "The one thing I feel good about is that we're leaving a good foundation for future success. We kind of bit the bullet a little this year and went young."

Camden Catholic president Jeff Nick thanked Brooks in a statement and said the school would form a committee "immediately" to find a new coach.

"We are grateful for the time Gil has spent with our student-athletes laying a strong foundation for a successful program," Nick said.