DeCarli led the Bonnies basketball in the late 1980’s
By Chuck Pollock, Sun Senior Sports Writer, photo from St. Bonaventure Athletics
From the time he graduated from Pennsylvania’s Clarion University in 1967, with degrees in education and biology, Ron DeCarli commenced an interesting life’s path.
He started at Elk County’s St. Marys Public school, teaching science and coaching basketball.
But he was soon felled by testicular cancer … a disease he beat. And the experience became fodder for the electric speeches he presented for most of his adult life.
After leaving St. Marys, he became a teacher/coach at New Jersey’s Chatham High School.
And though DeCarli had a losing record at his first school, he fared considerably better at Chatham. But what brought him to the attention of St. Bonaventure men’s basketball coach Jim Satalin was his work at basketball camps conducted by each school.
Satalin eventually hired DeCarli to be an assistant and when the former took a job at Duquesne, he encouraged successor, Jim O’Brien, to retain his aide.
Three years later, after O’Brien was hired by his alma mater, Boston College, in desperate need for a replacement, Bona, at O’Brien’s behest, hired DeCarli as head coach.
After starting with a 5-23 record in 1986-87, he produced back-to-back 13-15 seasons, seven of those 53 losses in one-possession games.
Because DeCarli was so popular locally, there was sentiment that he should be brought back. Indeed, Tom Missel, the Times Herald’s Bonnie beat writer and yours truly campaigned for just that outcome. He had a fairly solid roster featuring Elmer Anderson, Michael Burnett, Rocky Llewellyn, Sam Graham, Albert Middleton, Rich McCormick, Tom Boney and Rob Lanier, the latter of whom did an hysterical imitation of a DeCarli speech for his teammates.
Instead, after a long delay, Gannon coach Tom Chapman was hired and he crafted (?) a 22-62 record, nine fewer wins than his predecessor.
His coaching career over, DeCarli changed his proferssional path to scholastic administration, but continured his camp work. He became a superintendent at Hinsdale, Akron and Frontier and also served as principal at Oswayo Valley and Salamanca.
DeCARLI died Friday in Bradenton, Florida at the age of 80, less than a year after his wife, Kay, succumbed to Alzheimer’s.
Ron’s obit contained his verbal legacy, “sing your song, dream your dream and walk your walk.”
Indeed his biggest impact on this area, for years, was as a sought-after motivational speaker.
(Chuck Pollock, a Wellsville Sun and Olean Star senior sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@wnynet.net.)
