Steve Trimble, former professional football player and head football coach at Bishop O’Connell High School in Arlington, died July 11 at the school, according to Dr. Joseph E. Vorbach, O’Connell principal. He was 53.

Trimble died “suddenly and unexpectedly,” Vorbach said, and a cause had not yet been determined.

Trimble, born May 11, 1958, in Cumberland, Md., played football at Fort Hill High School in Cumberland and at the University of Maryland on a football scholarship. In 1981, he began four years in the National Football League as a defensive back with the Denver Broncos and the Chicago Bears.

Trimble played two years in the old United States Football League, including the Denver Gold, between his stints with the Broncos and the Bears. In 1987, he joined the inaugural Denver Dynamite in the Arena Football League, helping Denver win the first-ever Arena Bowl against the Pittsburgh Gladiators.

After retiring from pro football, Trimble coached with the Dynamite, the New York Jets and Howard University in Washington, D.C.

In 1996, Trimble and his family moved to Ashburn where he took a job with the Loudoun County Department of Parks, Recreation and Community Services.

In 1999, Trimble began assisting with coaching at O’Connell, where all four of his boys attended school, and he assumed the head coaching position in 2002.

“I like working with the kids and seeing how they grow up and how I’ve had an influence,” Trimble said in a 2008 interview with the Catholic Herald. “You’re around them all day. You have more of an impact on their lives.”

O'Connell President Kathleen Prebble said the Trimble family “is in our hearts and our prayers today.”

Trimble, who converted to the Catholic Faith in 2007, was a parishioner at St. Theresa Parish in Ashburn. He is survived by his wife, Gretchen, and his four sons, Jeremy, Jordan, Justin and Joshua.

Funeral arrangements are pending and will be posted when available.