Longtime Beaver football coach, WPIAL Hall of Famer Pat Tarquinio dies

By: Chris Harlan
Monday, February 27, 2023 | 7:49 PM

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Longtime Beaver football coach Pat Tarquinio, who was one of the winningest coaches in WPIAL history, has died. Beaver athletic director Alan Alcalde announced his death Monday.

Tarquinio won 241 games and three WPIAL titles at Beaver, where he coached from 1966-99. The Bobcats won WPIAL titles in 1972, ’81 and ’82. The school named its football field in his honor in 2019.

He previously coached seven seasons at Ellwood City and retired with a career record of 269-143-11 in 41 years. The WPIAL Hall of Fame inducted him in 2016.

One secret behind his coaching longevity was simple, he said at the time.

“If we want to get anything out of them and get respect from them and get them to play for us, we felt we had to let them know we cared about them,” Tarquinio said in 2016.

“No profanity, no getting in the kids’ face,” he added. “That’s one of the secrets.”

After retiring as a head coach, Tarquinio stayed involved in football as an assistant for Dave Vestal, first at Hopewell, where they won a WPIAL title in 2002, and later Seneca Valley.

He was inducted into the Beaver County Sports Hall of Fame in 1982.

As a quarterback at Juniata College, Tarquinio earned Little All-American honors in 1955, and his team earned a berth in the 1956 Tangerine Bowl. He was inducted into the Juniata Hall of Fame in 1995.

Chris Harlan is a TribLive reporter covering sports. He joined the Trib in 2009 after seven years as a reporter at the Beaver County Times. He can be reached at charlan@triblive.com.

Tags: Beaver