Dave Puddington

David George Puddington (July 9, 1928 – October 18, 2023) was an American football coach. He served as the head football coach at Washington University in St. Louis from 1962 to 1967 and at Kent State University from 1968 to 1970, compiling a career college football head coaching record of 45–37–3. Puddington was a native of Canton, Ohio. He played football and basketball at Ohio Wesleyan University. After serving in the United States Navy, Puddington began his coaching career as an assistant to Jack Fouts at Fairmont High School in Kettering, Ohio. He was appointed head football coach there in 1958 and led his team to a 9–0 record and a seventh-place ranking among high schools in the state that season. In 1959, Puddington moved to Kent State, where he served as backfield coach under Trevor J. Rees for three seasons.

Puddington resigned as head coach at Kent State following the 1970 season, noting "the prevailing contagious negativism on campus and in the community". Four students had been killed that May in the Kent State shootings. Puddington returned to coaching for one season in 1977 at Lake Braddock Secondary School in Burke, Virginia.

Following his coaching career, Puddington worked in fundraising and public relations for Ohio University, West Virginia Wesleyan College, Thomas Edison State University, and Morrisville State College. He and his wife, Jean, moved to Lowville, New York in 2009. Puddington died on October 18, 2023, at the home of his son, Jim, in Gainesville, Georgia. He was 95.

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