Andres was a 1967 graduate of Malone who majored in Social Studies Comprehensive and has now entered the Malone Athletics Hall of Fame. Don was an outstanding four-year letterman and three-year starter on the Pioneer men’s basketball team from 1963 to 1967. A 1963 graduate of Niles McKinley High School, Don was an outstanding basketball athlete, who still ranks 12th in all-time scoring at the school. Yet his skills and his humble leadership ability grew tremendously at Malone. Tom Morgan, who was Don’s coach at Malone for all four of his seasons, has the utmost respect for Don in many ways.
“I remember Don as a quiet, unassuming guy who laid everything on the line in both practices and games,” Morgan recalls. “What he lacked in quickness, he made up in how he intelligently played the game. His turnovers were minimized and he was considered by his teammates as an unselfish, hustling, heads-up player…one you could always count on to come through. While it’s been some time since I coached Don, I remember him as a model citizen both on and off-campus. He was a serious student who assiduously prepared to enter the coaching profession as soon as he finished college.” And how true those words from Morgan turned out to be as we’ll hear in a moment.
Among numerous other accomplishments to his credit while at Malone, Don is most likely very proud of the fact that he was an instrumental member of the very first winning Malone basketball team, which occurred in the 1965-66 season. That team posted an overall record of 15-11. As a sophomore, he posted an impressive 87.3% free throw percentage which ranked seventh in the NAIA nationally at the time. He earned Second Team All-Mid Ohio Conference Honors and the team’s “Hustle” award as a junior and was voted First Team All MOC as a senior. He was the team’s leading scorer as a junior (at 15.6 points per game) and as a senior (with 18.1 points per outing). He was also a two-time captain and the team’s MVP as a senior….and Don currently ranks 32nd on Malone’s all-time scoring list with 1187 points. In addition to basketball, Don was a one-year starter and letterman on Malone’s 1965 baseball team and posted a .280 batting average.
After graduating from Malone, Don took postgraduate courses at Youngstown State University and then earned a Master of Education degree from Westminster College (PA) in 1975. He also took additional post-grad courses at Kent State University in 1980 and 1998. Don was a head boys varsity basketball coach for 32 years before his recent retirement after the 2008-09 season at Howland High School, where he coached his last four years. He also had coaching stints at Warren John F. Kennedy (for 5 years), Howland (for 10 years), Niles McKinley (for 10 years) and Reynolds High School (for 3 years). He has a 341-292 record as a varsity boys coach. Don won nine sectional titles as head coach and was honored as the Trumbell County Coach of the Year nine times and the District Coach of the Year four times. A teacher for 43 years and a “Who’s Who in American Teachers” honoree, Don has touched countless lives for good, both on and off the court. He has been employed with the Howland Local School District for 34 years and currently holds the position of Ohio Work Adjustment Coordinator – a career-based intervention program. Don and his wife, Rebecca, reside in Niles, Ohio and they have three grown children (Heather, Kristen, and Nikki) and three grandchildren.
Don’s presenter tonight knows him extremely well and sees him as a fairly reserved, yet intense, individual as he points out here in one situation.
“Anyone who knows Don, knows he is a reserved person,” recalls Doug Foster, Don’s colleague, friend, and son-in-law. “But Howland was playing a conference game last season and his team made a last-second shot at the buzzer to win the game. Well, in all the hoopla, everyone was looking for him and he’s up in the stands with his hands raised -- Jimmy Valvano style – and running all over the place. It was really good to see that kind of passion that we all know is in there, to come out at that time in that way.”
NOTE: Andres currently ranks 38th on Malone's all-time scoring list.
