William Guy "Bill" Mallory

Bill Mallory, beloved husband, father, grandfather, coach and friend, passed away peacefully at 3:08PM, Friday at Bloomington Hospice House. He was surrounded by his extended family the last days with love, gratitude and celebration. The outpouring of respect and fondness for Coach Mallory from friends was deeply appreciated by his family.. Mallory, 82, was Indiana University’s football coach from 1984 through 1996. He and wife Ellie had lived in the Bloomington community since then, with wintertime residency in Naples, Fla. Their ties to community activities here won them many recognitions, among them Bill’s selection by the Monroe County Sports Hall of Fame as Humanitarian of the Year in 2016. William Guy Mallory was born May 30, 1935, to Guy and Freda Shepherd Mallory in Glendale, W. Va. His father was a smalltown high school basketball coach in southwestern Ohio, then later in mid-Ohio, near Columbus. “Dad was a big guy – 6-5,” Mallory once told an interviewer. “He was a good basketball player, and he loved it. I thought I was going to be a basketball coach.” He never played football until a change of professions took his father to the north end of the state at Sandusky, Ohio. He took up the sport as a high school sophomore, and as a senior was recruited by future Hall of Fame coach Ara Parseghian at Miami of Ohio. He played freshman football, then two varsity seasons under Parseghian. As a senior Mallory was the first captain under new coach John Pont. On graduation, he earned a master’s degree while serving as a graduate assistant at Bowling Green under another College Football Hall of Fame coach, Doyt Perry. He coached one year of high school football in Ohio, went back to Bowling Green as defensive coordinator, served as an assistant under Carmen Cozza at Yale, then joined the staff of Hall of Famer Woody Hayes at Ohio State. He was an assistant on Hayes’ 1968 national-championship team, then started his own head coaching career at his alma mater, Miami. In five years at Miami, he went 39-12 and beat Florida in the Tangerine Bowl; at Colorado 35-21-1 with an Orange Bowl trip – and he was fired. After a year out of coaching, he went to Northern Illinois for four seasons, went 25-19 with a Mid-American Conference championship and California Bowl trip his last year, and Indiana hired him. His IU career, as the school’s third head coach in three years, began with an 0-11 season. Two years later, he took his team to the school’s third bowl trip in history and was named by his peers as Big Ten Coach of the Year. In his fourth year, 1987, his team ended a 35-year winless run against Ohio State by winning at Columbus, 31-10. Two weeks later at home, the Hoosiers beat Michigan for the first time in 20 years, 14-10. It’s the only time IU ever beat Ohio State and Michigan in the same season. Those Hoosiers went to Michigan State on the next-last Saturday of the year with the winner assured of a Big Ten championship and Rose Bowl trip. Playing without starting quarterback Dave Schnell, out with an appendectomy, the Hoosiers lost, 26-3 – and Mallory took on folk hero status in East Lansing by going after the game into the jubilant Spartan lockerroom. In a scene captured by TV cameras and replayed frequently there over the years, he acknowledged how bitter the loss was for him and his hopeful team, congratulated the Spartans and challenged them to win the Rose Bowl. He left to a roaring ovation from the MSU team, and the Spartans did end a six-year Big Ten losing streak by beating Southern California in the Rose Bowl. IU then closed an 8-3 season by beating Purdue and going to the Peach Bowl in Atlanta, and Mallory became the first Big Ten football coach to win back-to-back Coach of the Year awards. Overall, he had seven winning seasons and took six teams to bowls, both IU records. Mallory’s close ties to the players he coached are reflected by an Internet-linked fraternity of “Mal Men,” well into the hundreds of former players who over the years have shared very similar tales of their own “Coach Mal” stories and maintained ties with their coach from each of his four head coaching stops. Those former players were the primary sources of the messages and condolences that poured into the family from all over the country after news broke of Mallory’s Tuesday fall and grave situation. It was at Sandusky High that sophomore Mallory met freshman Eleanor “Ellie” Sweeney. A year after his recruitment at Miami, she also enrolled there, as a music major. After both graduated there, and just as Mallory was about to begin his head coaching career at East Palestine High School near Youngstown, they were married June 14, 1958. His death came five days before his 83rd birthday, three weeks before their 60th wedding anniversary. Surviving are their daughter Barbara Britt (and husband Jim), Long Ttree, Col., their sons David (wife Martha, and great granddaughter Isabella), Michael and Scott, all of Denver, and sons Mike Mallory (wife Kim, granddaughter Kathryn and grandson William); Doug Mallory (wife Lisa, and their daughters Emily, Allison and Sarah, Atlanta, Ga.), and Curt Mallory (wife Lori, and their sons James and Sam and daughter Margo), Terre Haute. Also surviving are Coach Mallory’s brothers, Tom and Dave, both of Loudonville, Ohio. Michael Britt and Tom and Dave Mallory are doctors. The three Mallory sons all are football coaches, Mike an assistant with the Jacksonville Jaguars, Doug an assistant with the Atlanta Falcons and Curt in his second year as head coach at Indiana State. Daughter Barb is a former school teacher who now works for the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine in Denver. Memorial Services for Bill will be held Saturday, June 2, 2018 at 10:00AM at the First United Methodist Church, 219 East 4th Street, Bloomington, Indiana 47408. A Celebration of Life Service will follow at 1:30PM at the Indiana University Memorial Stadium 1001 East 17th Street Bloomington, Indiana 47408. Visitation will be held Friday June 1, 2018 from 3:00PM until 8:00PM at Allen Funeral Home and Crematory 4155 South Old State Road 37, Bloomington, Indiana 47401. In lieu of flowers Bill’s family encourages your consideration of a donation in Bill’s memory to one of the following organizations; the Indiana State Football Program at honorbillmallory.com , the Boys and Girls Club of Bloomington at bgcbloomington.org, or the Indiana University Football Program in care of the Indiana University Foundation at myiu.org. Online condolences, photos and memories may be shared with family and friends at www.allencares.com.

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William Guy "Bill" Mallory

May 30, 1935 - May 25, 2018