ASHTABULA — Imagine a backfield with these players in it. St. John’s Denny Allan. Geneva’s Mark Debevc. Ashtabula’s Wash Lyons.

That’s some pretty fast company in which to be running, considering not only what they did on the gridirons of Ashtabula County in the early 1960s, but what they accomplished for some of the nation’s greatest college football powers. Allan went on to a solid career for Ara Parseghian at Notre Dame, Debevc helped Woody Hayes’ Ohio State Buckeyes claim the 1968 national championship and Lyons played for the great Bill Hess at Ohio University. Many feel Lyons might have made the NFL if injuries had not intervened, while Debevc also got a shot at the NFL.

Then think about this. Edgewood High School’s Dave Melaragno’s name was linked to all three of those players when he played for the Warriors. You can look it up.

One finds Melaragno mentioned as one of four unanimous first-team selections in his senior season of 1965 to the Star Beacon All-Ashtabula County team. He shared the first-team backfield with Debevc and Allan.

Although Lyons had gone on to Ohio University when Melaragno actually played officially, Edgewood coach Dave Six used Melaragno as the guy who impersonated Lyons in the Warriors’ preparations for their battles with the Panthers early in his time at Edgewood.

Another person to whom Melaragno has been connected for years, Ashtabula’s Mike Kaydo, was the other unanimous selection to that team. Years later, Melaragno would serve as an assistant coach on Kaydo’s staff at Edgewood, then succeeded him as the Warriors’ head coach in 1982.

Now, they all have something in common again. Allan, Debevc, Kaydo and Lyons have previously been selected to the Ashtabula County Football Hall of Fame. On Dec. 7, Melaragno will join that august company at the Ashtabula County Touchdown Club Awards Banquet.

“I was shocked,” he said of the call he received about his induction. “There have been a lot of good athletes who had good numbers and good years over the years. I don’t think I’d have been anywhere without the other guys on my team.”

Apparently, they helped him out a lot, especially in his senior year, when he became the first Edgewood running back to top 1,000 yards rushing, racking up 1,116 yards on only 149 carries for a 7.5-yard average. He was also the Ashtabula County scoring leader that year with 82 points, leading the Northeastern Conference as well in scoring with 40 points in Edgewood’s first year in the league. He earned Coaches’ All-NEC honors that year.

Another factor for Melaragno was his status as a highly respected member of the county coaching fraternity for more than 20 years, first as an assistant at St. John and Edgewood, then as a head coach at both. Although he finished 17-year career as a head coach after the 2000 season at SS. John and Paul with a 61-109 record (.359 winning percentage), he was the last Edgewood coach to produce a conference championship squad with the 1986 Warriors, who won the NEC with a 9-1 record in the days when the NEC had 10 teams, including Madison and Riverside.

Melaragno said wins and losses, while important, wer not the most vital things he tried to communicate to his players.

“Character was the most important thing,” he said. “We probably didn’t win as many games as we wanted, but the most important thing to me was that the kids respected the game and respected what we did.”



All in the family

It probably was virtually impossible for Melaragno not to develop a love for football considering his family background. The youngest of three sons of single mother Anita Melaragno, who still lives in Ashtabula at age 89, he and older brothers Vince, a 1961 St. John graduate, and Terry, a 1964 Herald alumnus, used to mix it up on fields near their home on Blair Avenue.

“I used to play all the time with my brothers,” he said.

His first organized football experience came in the seventh and eighth grade while attending St. Joseph’s Elementary School. Allan and other future St. John standouts like Ron DiPiero and Jim Rebera were among his teammates. St. Joseph’s was part of a highly competitive Catholic school league in the area that included fellow Ashtabula schools Mount Carmel and Mother of Sorrows, St. Francis Cabrini from Conneaut and Assumption School from Geneva.

“St. John had a lot of good players to draw on from all those schools,” he said. “Mount Carmel was probably the best of them all. They had Fran Dramis and Ron Severino.

“I had good friends on all those teams, but when you were out on the field, it was always a battle. Then you were friends again after the game. I wouldn’t have traded those experiences for anything.”

So it was a natural for young Melaragno to head just a few blocks away to St. John for his freshman year.



With the Heralds

In those days, St. John, then coached by Hall of Famer Dan McGinnis, had enough players that it could field a team exclusively for freshmen. That squad was coached by ex-Marine Roland “Smokey” Cinciarelli.

“We had guys like Denny Allan, Fran Dramis, Mike Madonna and Ron Severino on that team,” Melaragno said. “Coach Cinciarelli was a no-nonsense kind of guy. He was tough, but we were always in shape physically.”

The freshmen did get their shot against the older Heralds in practice. Boy, did Melaragno ever get one, too.

“We were in practice and we were running a kickoff drill,” he said. “I went down on coverage and (his brother) Terry hit me and broke my nose. We were always mixing it up.”

But that was to be Melaragno’s only season with the Heralds. He showed a keen sense of team and sacrifice after that year.

“My mom and dad were divorced, and it was a tough time financially,” he said. “Both of my brothers were already in school, and I didn’t want them to have to transfer, so I decided to go to Edgewood for my sophomore year.”

One can only imagine what McGinnis must have felt when the youngster decided to transfer. Had he stayed, Dave Melaragno might well have shared the offensive backfield in his sophomore season with his brother, Terry, and Allan. During Dave Melaragno’s sophomore year of 1963, St. John went 6-3 and followed that up with records of 7-2-1 in 1964 and 4-5-1 in 1965.



With the Warriors

But St. John’s loss would eventually turn out to be Edgewood’s gain. It’s just that coach Dave Six had to wait a year to utilize young Melaragno’s talent. In that era, transfer rules were much more severe. Melaragno was forced to sit out his sophomore year at Edgewood by demand of the Ohio High School Athletic Association.

That did not prevent him from practicing, though, so Six put his talents to good use on the scout team. He impersonated backs like Allan, Lyons, Debevc and Madison’s Bob Zubek. Those drills helped acquaint Melaragno with the nuances of the wing-T offense Six employed and gave him familiarity with the abilities of his teammates. The Warriors probably took a different approach to the wing-T than their rivals, who generally used that formation, too.

“Dave would really try to spread teams out,” Melaragno said. “He’d run a lot of motion. He tried to do everything he could to keep teams off balance.

“We’d throw the ball probably 10 or 12 times a game, which was a lot back then. He liked to pull with the tackles. The wing-T relied a lot on misdirection. He’d try and call plays the opponents weren’t ready for.”

Like Cinciarelli, Six was an old military man and a strict disciplinarian, but that was something Melaragno really appreciated.

“You had such a respect level for them,” he said. “At the same time, you knew they cared about you.

“I just loved Dave’s approach to the game. He told you he wanted you to be agile, mobile and hostile. You played really hard because you cared about him. Even with my own kids, I used the same approach, whether I was coaching my son (Keith) or my daughters (Stacy and Sara). I always told them, ‘Once you start something, you’re going to finish it.’”

He also came to embrace Six’s philosophy of surrounding himself with good people on his coaching staff.

“We had guys like Billy Jo Armstrong, Bob Dean, Barry Hess and Gene Arrigoni on the coaching staff,” Melaragno said. “They had been great players and they were great coaches, too.”



Into the action

When he finally got on the field officially in his junior year, Melaragno basically found himself playing defense in Six’s 5-2 alignment, although he did get some time at running back.

“Dave liked to play his seniors on offense, so he used the juniors more on defense,” Melaragno said. “We ran a 5-2 with a double invert, which basically meant you were playing with four linebackers a lot of the time.”

Melaragno backed up Bobby Lee at running back. The chief movers of the offense were quarterback Dave Huey and wide receiver Tim Horst, another Ashtabula County Football Hall of Famer who went on the play at Penn State in the early years of Joe Paterno’s reign.

Just to show the deception Six relied upon, Melaragno pointed to a stunning figure.

“We scored nine touchdowns on tackle eligibles that year,” he said.

In an era when football was at its height in the area, the Warriors held their own against any opposition. In Melaragno’s junior season, they went 8-2, losing to the Fairport team that claimed the WRL championship for the late Chet Rojeck and that he coached to the mythical Class A state championship, featuring flashy running back Paul “Pee Wee” Kapostasy. The other loss was to a 9-1 Ashtabula team coached by Hall of Famer Tony Chiacchiero.



That special season

Melaragno really got his chance to shine in his senior season. He gives full credit to the teammates who made that happen.

“We had Ron Showalter at tight end, Denny Zee at wide receiver, Dave Locy and Chuck Lago at the tackles, Keith Hawn and Bill Smith at the guards and Gene Rust at center,” he said. “Terry McConnell was the quarterback with Steve Bish, John Conway was the wingback and Larry Gloeckler and Ken Mauro were at fullback. Our backs were probably as big as the linemen.

“Those guys put me in a position where I was able to get the ball a lot. I owe so much to all of them. The sad thing is, three of them (Gloeckler, Lago and Smith) are gone now.”

Because of the diversity of Six’s offense, the carries got spread around. But Melaragno made the most of them.

“I never carried the ball more than 16 times in a game,” Melaragno, who played at 5-foot-10, 185 pounds, said.

By that year, Edgewood was making its debut in the NEC. It’s only losses were to Chiacchiero’s 9-0 Ashtabula squad, forcing the Warriors to finish second, and to Erie Prep.

“Mike McCoy, who played with Denny Allan at Notre Dame, played for Erie Prep,” Melaragno said.

He saved the best for last. Against Kirtland, Melaragno scored six touchdowns.

“I had four called back, too,” he said with a smile. “But stats didn’t make all that much of a difference to me.”

The local pitched battles the Warriors fought on a weekly basis meant more.

“The ones that stand out to me were the games against Ashtabula, Conneaut and Geneva, especially the ones when I was playing against Debevc,” he said. “It’s an honor to be considered on the same level as those guys because with I’ve become real good friends with so many of them over the years.

“Those were great days in football around here. Somebody in Ashtabula had a home game every Friday night and on every Saturday night. I always thought it was a shame they got away from that.”



The next level

The intercession of people like Six and Matt Carson helped give Melaragno his shot at college football.

“Matt Carson took me to places like Edinboro, Thiel and Tiffin,” he said. “One day, Dave came down and talked to me about Salem College in West Virginia. The day after I graduated, we went down there and visited.

“We visited with (head coach) Dale Evans and (assistant) Don Young down there. It probably only takes about five hours to get there now, but it was probably about seven back then. But I just liked the coaches down there.”

He was just happy to find a school that was willing to help him get his education.

“My oldest brother had gone to Ohio State. Terry had gone to Ohio University and was there when (Philadelphia Phillies Hall of Famer) Mike Schmidt was there.

“I needed something to go to school. Regardless of what it took, my mother was going to make sure I got my education, but that really helped out.”

He already had a fair notion of his career direction.

“I kind of had the idea I wanted to be like Dave Six,” Melaragno said. “When I first went to Salem, I was majoring in phys ed.”

His freshman year at Salem worked out well, too.

“I got some playing time down there, a lot at running back,” Melaragno said. “They ran the I down there, so they used a lot of running backs. I found out a lot of times the guy who came in as the sixth or seventh guy was as good or better than the guy that was the starter at first.”

So it seemed he was ticketed for an even more significant role as a sophomore. That came to a sudden ending.

“We were in two-a-days before my sophomore year and I tore my ACL,” Melaragno said. “That was the end of my playing days.”



Back to Ashtabula

He came home and finished up his sophomore year at Kent State University-Ashtabula Campus. Then he transferred to Kent State’s main campus and graduated in 1973.

“I went into the National Guard for six months, too,” Melaragno said. “I was in there with guys like (Sheriff) Billy Johnson, George Bucko and (future teaching and coaching colleague) Al Goodwin.”

Because he was still rehabilitating his injured knee, Melaragno couldn’t maintain the activity to continue with his physical education major, so he switched to English. After he graduated, he spent the summer playing softball for the Crow’s Nest team and got some career help from new St. John basketball coach Denny Berrier.

“I ended up teaching English and I got a job on (Hall of Famer) Paul Kopko’s football staff,” he said. “I was the defensive coordinator from 1973-75. The 1973 team (7-3) went to the playoffs for the first time. We had a lot of great players like Steve Abraham, Ron Detore, Dave Massucci and Pat Giannell.

“I learned a lot from (Kopko). He was another no-nonsense guy. I learned a lot about organization from him.”

But Melaragno just missed out on St. John’s first trip to the Class A state Final Four in 1976.

“I got a better offer from Tom Duff at Perry,” he said. “I was the defensive coordinator and running backs coach.”

But he only stayed one season there.

“I interviewed with (new coach Bob) Ritley (who went on to a career of hall of fame stature with the Pirates) at Perry, but I just wasn’t comfortable there,” Melaragno said.



His own man

Fortunately, his connections at Edgewood paid off again.

“I got a job on Mike Kaydo’s staff,” Melaragno said. “Matt Carson was the principal and Jerry Peterson was the superintendent. I coached the running backs and defensive line.

“Mike was a great football coach. He really knew the game. He let you coach your position and he trusted what his assistants did.”

In the years after, Melaragno returned the favor and had Kaydo as one of the assistants on some of his finest teams.

When Melaragno got the head coaching job, he drew on all his experiences as a player.

“As a player, I had learned discipline and to be prompt,” he said. “I learned if you do stuff enough, it becomes second nature.”

He believed his own coaching philosophies were a blend of what he learned from all the coaches with whom he worked.

“Dave Six was probably the most important,” Melaragno said. “He was always fair. If he told you something was going to happen, he would do it. You knew if you messed up, you would pay the penalty.”

But he took from other sources, too.

“I like to treat everybody the same,” Melaragno said. “From Paul Kopko, I got organization and learned to be a student of the game. Mike Kaydo was always fair. He let his coaches make the decisions. You knew you could trust him because he trusted you.”

Like Six, Melaragno tried to make sure he surrounded himself with competent assistants.

“I tried to surround myself with good people,” he said. “I think I had great people working with me like (Kaydo), Dave Dewey, Jim Pinelli, Jay Corlew, Bob Frey, Joe Ditirro, Ed Dick and the list goes on. Every guy I had was a good coach.”

It’s not hard to pick his most memorable team. It could well have been the perfect team.

“That 1986 season was special,” Melaragno said. “We had great players like Brad Petro, Tom Mixer, Gary Dietrich, Eric Runnion, Lou Wisnyai, Bob Frey and Eric Johnson.

“We lost to Solon, 14-8. We lost the ball on their one when we were going in or we could have been undefeated.”

But there were other fine teams.

“I thought the teams we had in 1995, 1996 and 1997 were really good,” he said. “That 1995 team (7-3) had Chris Chesnes and Ed Colbert. In 1996 (8-2), we had Colbert and Keith Melaragno, who ran for 1,000 yards. In 1997 (3-7), Keith ran for 1,000 yards again (before heading off to play at the University of Akron).”

But not all his memorable teams had great records.

“My first year (1-9), we had Scott Hewitt and the Morano brothers,” Melaragno said. “One of the toughest teams we had was 0-10 (1991), but would knock your socks off.”

The 1997 season was his last as head coach at Edgewood. His final season came at SJP in 2000 (3-7).

“I got talked into doing that one,” he laughed. “Joe Montanaro was a great coach for us. And Don Lagoni set the state record at the time for receptions that year.”



Family matters

Melaragno feels blessed that he not only had the chance to coach Keith, the middle of the three children he and the former Linda Flack, a 1970 Edgewood graduate, have been blessed with in their 32 years of marriage, but that he also got to coach his oldest child, Stacy, and youngest child, Sara.

“Anytime you have the opportunity to coach one of your children, you should do it,” he said. “I felt fortunate to coach Stacy and Sara in softball, too.

“I used to love sitting down with Keith and watching films together. I think he became a real student of the game.”

Stacy, a 1996 Edgewood graduate, went on to play four years of varsity volleyball at Cleveland State University. Now an occupational therapist, she and her husband, Scott Borgio, a certified public accountant, live in Mentor and recently gave the Melaragnos their second grandchild, Isabella, 21⁄2 months.

Keith, a 1998 Edgewood graduate, eventually transferred from Akron to Kent State and earned a degree in industrial technology. He lives in Stow.

Sara, a 2000 Edgewood product, also went to Kent State and earned a degree in criminal justice. She and her husband, Justin Sprague, live in Conneaut and gave the Melaragnos their first grandchild, Julia, 3 months.



Other career moves

Melaragno has kept himself immersed in athletics. He succeeded Goodwin as Edgewood’s athletic director for the 2001-02 school year and has been in that role ever since.

Those responsibilities have taken him from the coaching arena, which he does miss to some degree.

“Sometimes I miss being a football coach,” he said. “I miss Friday nights and the games. I even miss practice. It’s the other stuff I don’t miss.”

So football continues to have a profound impact on Melaragno’s life.

“If I didn’t have football, I’m not sure what I would have done,” he said. “It kept me off the streets when I was a kid. It taught me discipline and gave me character. It taught me how to work with people. It taught me how to raise my kids.

“It’s meant a lot. It still does.”