Mulligan Calls It Quits at UC Irvine : Basketball: In his third consecutive losing season, he decides he has had enough. He will coach for rest of season.

UC Irvine Coach Bill Mulligan, who had hoped to see his team recover from last season’s 5-23 record only to see the Anteaters struggle again, announced his resignation Wednesday, saying he “just didn’t want to be part of it anymore.”

Mulligan, Irvine’s coach the past 11 seasons and a coach for 14 more at Riverside City College and Saddleback College, had only one losing season before 1989, when Irvine posted the first of three consecutive losing seasons.

“It’s a great life except when you lose,” said Mulligan, who will coach the team for the remainder of the season. “I got to the point where the losing just ate at me.”

The Anteaters’ record last season was the worst in school history and included a school-record 15-game losing streak. They are 8-17 with five games remaining this season and have lost eight of their past nine.

Mulligan, who will turn 61 Feb. 24, resigned with a year remaining on his contract.

He and Athletic Director Tom Ford were emphatic that the resignation was Mulligan’s decision.

“He asked me to visit,” Ford said. “I tried to dissuade him from that decision and consider another option.”

Mulligan added that the school gave him a settlement that would enable him to retire, which he called a “big issue.”

“I didn’t get fired,” said Mulligan, whose record at Irvine was 160-154. “I know every time you read a guy resigns, you say, ‘Yeah, sure he resigned.’ I did resign. I just didn’t want to do it anymore.”

“I didn’t think he’d go,” said Ricky Butler, Irvine’s senior center. “I thought we’d have a good year, and he’d be back to finish his contract.

“I just want to win the last five games for him,” he said, pausing at the thought of the UNLV game. “Win four out of the last five.”

Later, Mulligan met reporters in an emotional session.

“What I’m really doing is retiring from coaching,” Mulligan said. “One, I hate losing. That’s probably the main reason. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life around hotels in places like Las Cruces, even though (New Mexico State Coach Neil McCarthy) says it’s a hell of a place, or Logan, Utah. I’d just as soon not do that.

“I want to be able to spend time with my family. I want to be able to see my grandchild grow up, because I missed seeing my kids grow up--a lot. The family is very supportive of what I’m doing. . . . I’m really happy. I’m really delighted with what I’m doing.”

Brian Mulligan, one of Mulligan’s three sons and a basketball coach at Capistrano Valley High, had seen his father enjoy his job less in recent years.

“He felt like he could turn it around, but it got to the point it wasn’t any fun,” Brian Mulligan said. “He got to the point of saying he didn’t have enthusiasm for it. It wasn’t any fun.”