One of Oakland’s greatest and most-beloved coaches will put down the headset after Laney College’s final game of the 2024 season.

Legendary Skyline High and Laney College football coach John Beam told the Bay Area News Group on Friday that after almost five decades on the sidelines, he’s ready for a change.

“Forty-five years seemed like a good time go to out,” Beam said, later adding, “It’s been a good run, brother.”

Introduced to a national audience when his team was featured on the Netflix series “Last Chance U” in 2020, Beam began his coaching career as an assistant at Skyline in 1982, eventually leading the Titans to 15 Oakland Athletic League championships, 11 section championships, four undefeated seasons and an unbeaten record in league play throughout the 1990s before moving on to Laney.

The Eagles won the 2018 state community college title under Beam, who said he considered retirement at other times the past five years.

Beam, 65, will remain on as Laney’s athletic director, and plans on staying involved in the community.

UVA’s Bennett retires, citing NIL >> Describing himself as “a square peg in a round hole,” a tearful Tony Bennett said Friday he suddenly retired from coaching at Virginia because he wasn’t suited to navigate the current landscape of college basketball.

Dressed in his signature suit-minus-tie look, the 2019 championship-winning coach told those gathered at his exit news conference that name, image and likeness money and the transfer portal have brought elements to the job that he’s “not great at.”

He is the latest — and, at 55 years old — youngest high-profile coach to walk away citing a measure of burnout with the modern realities of the profession.

Hired away from Washington State in 2009, Bennett went on to post 14 straight winning seasons after a 15-16 record his first year at UVa,

He posted a 364-136 mark at the school, leading the program to two ACC Tournament titles, six ACC regular-season championships and 10 NCAA Tournament appearances. Bennett was named ACC Coach of the Year in 2014, 2015, 2018 and 2019.

MWC commish stands up for SJSU >> Mountain West Conference Commissioner Gloria Nevarez said Thursday the forfeitures that volleyball teams are willing to take to avoid playing San Jose State is “not what we celebrate in college athletics” and that she is heartbroken over what has transpired this season surrounding the Spartans and their opponents.

Four teams have canceled games against San Jose State: Boise State, Southern Utah, Utah State and Wyoming, with none of the schools explicitly saying why they were forfeiting.

A group of Nevada players issued a statement saying they will not take the floor when the Wolf Pack are scheduled to host the Spartans on Oct. 26.

“It breaks my heart because they’re human beings, young people, student-athletes on both sides of this issue that are getting a lot of national negative attention,” Nevarez said in an interview with The Associated Press at Mountain West basketball media days. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.”

The cancellations could mean some teams will not qualify for the conference tournament Nov. 27-30 in Las Vegas.