Longtime assistant Cuellar lands top job with Bobcats

EDINBURG - With longtime coach Joe Filoteo taking over the athletic director duties at Edinburg CISD earlier this summer, the school board on Monday night selected his veteran first assistant Zeke Cuellar to pilot the boys basketball program.

Cuellar now has the task of filling the void left by Filoteo, who built the Bobcats' program into a Rio Grande Valley basketball powerhouse. During Filoteo's 25 years at the helm of the program, he owned a 553-310 mark with eight district championships and three appearances in the Sweet 16 - the last of which came during a record-setting 32-4 run by the Bobcats last season.

"Keeping the continuity of the program together was a major key," said Cuellar, 45. "You know, for me to work under Coach Filoteo has been a privilege and an honor. And we hope to continue on that tradition that he's established here."

While the position drew a lot of interest, Filoteo said, there were only four applicants - those that filled out the necessary paperwork to apply for the position. The other two finalists were current Edinburg Economedes coach Lalo Rios, a former standout at Edinburg High and later the University of Texas-Pan American and Pete Smith, the assistant coach at Pasadena High in Houston.

"We received a lot of calls, inquiries about the opening," Filoteo said. "But, in the end, we liked the idea of keeping everything in place. Coach Cuellar keeps his staff, he already knows the kids and he'll keep the Runnin' Bobcats on the right track.

"He's been my first assistant for eight years, so he knows how to get the job done."