Bear River fired 20-season head coach Chris Wise. The school announced the move Friday in an email sent to parents.

The change doesn’t affect Wise’s status as a teacher at the school, according to the letter, written by school principal AJ Gilmore.

“I need to make you aware of a difficult decision that was made. The Bear River High School Football program is parting ways with Coach Chris Wise as the head football coach,” Gilmore wrote in the email. “Coach Wise has made a tremendous positive impact on our students, players, and community in the 20 years that he led this program. He will continue as a teacher for the Box Elder School District at Bear River High.

Wise sent a statement to the Standard-Examiner.

“I came to Bear River to help raise our valley’s boys into men, to bring a state championship and to demand a high standard in every area of life. I’ve been blessed to have had thousands of boys become men in part because of me, we’ve had three state championships (the only ones in school history) and the standards have held high consistently. I wouldn’t change a thing,” read Wise’s statement.

Gilmore didn’t return a request for comment by publication time.

Wise’s tenure, from 2002-21, ends with a 111-113 overall record, making him by far the winningest coach in terms of overall wins in BRHS school history.

The Bears were the capstone of the 3A classification nearly two decades ago when they won state championships in 2003, 2004 and 2006, which were unprecedented glory years for a school that only had one prior period of sustained success, that being in the 1980s.

Bear River football won three region titles under Wise, a BRHS graduate and former Weber State lineman.

In the last four seasons, Bear River has a 14-29 record including a 0-10 mark this season with a young, inexperienced team.

Matters have been more difficult lately as Bear River’s region counterparts, the five Cache County schools, are all about 100-250 students larger than BRHS — as is most of the 4A classification, and as are most of the schools in 4A.

Two years ago, Wise was suspended for the first two games of the 2019 season as a result of an inquiry sparked by an email from the former booster club president that examined how money was being used in the program.

For years, parents would pay for their kids to go to the weeklong Bear River football camp in the summer, and the inquiry found Wise would redistribute some of that money to his assistant coaches, who were otherwise not being paid for their work helping run the camp.

The inquiry also found Wise was charging a fee for summer weight room use since teachers/coaches weren’t paid by the school to be there.

A statewide audit around the same time found similar things (i.e. charging fees for things that shouldn’t have been charged for) were happening at various extracurricular programs at schools all across the state.

Policy changes at both local and state levels have since dramatically changed how school fees work.