The College announced today the passing on Sunday of Guilford College Athletics Hall of Famer Jerry Steele, who coached the men’s basketball team to national success from 1962-70. He’s survived by his wife, Kitty, who taught at Guilford and was the College’s first coach of women’s intercollegiate volleyball, basketball, and tennis.
In the 10 seasons before Jerry arrived at Guilford, the men’s basketball team won a total of 25 games. In his eight years as coach, the Quakers were 150-76. The 1969-70 team won 29 straight games on the way to a program-best 32-5 record and a fourth-place NAIA National Tournament finish. Three years later, Guilford won a national title.
A few years ago, some of Jerry’s former players from the early 1960s collaborated on a story published on Guilford’s website, Guilford’s Men of Steele.
Jerry guided the Quakers to a pair of Carolinas Conference championships when Guilford was matched against other North Carolina small college rivals including High Point, Elon, Catawba, Lenoir-Rhyne, and Mars Hill in a memorable era. Fans in the 1960s and 1970s packed Alumni Gym — known then as the Cracker Box — for home games.
Jerry left Guilford to work as a coach and executive with the Greensboro-based Carolina Cougars of the American Basketball Association. In 1972, he returned to college coaching at High Point, where he compiled a 459-412 record in 32 seasons before retiring in 2003. He also served as the university’s athletic director.
His players at Guilford included two-time NAIA All-American Bob Kauffman ’68, the third pick of the 1968 NBA Draft. One of his earliest players at High Point was Tubby Smith, who won a national title as head coach at Kentucky and is now coach at his alma mater.
Memorial arrangements for Jerry are incomplete. Please join the College in holding Kitty and the Steele family in the Light.