Dave Carlisle, Millennium Hall of Fame

Richard Dunn

For someone thrust into coaching basketball at Estancia High, it’s

hard to believe Dave Carlisle took over under such circumstances

considering the players he groomed and teams he coached.

The head man of Estancia’s first great basketball teams, igniting a

program that has traditionally produced championship contenders, Carlisle

arrived at the school as a football coach.

But, after one year, the Estancia Athletic Department had a courtside

void to fill.

Carlisle, who had coached hoops at TeWinkle Junior High in Costa Mesa

for three years and was just completing his second autumn as the Eagles’

sophomore gridiron coach, was asked to replace Gary Carr, sort of.

“They kind of forced me into that,” Carlisle said of his Estancia head

basketball coaching assignment in 1972, which started a memorable

six-year term.

Under Carlisle, the Eagles began at the bottom of the Irvine League

heap, then became champions of the Century League with a talented 1977

squad led by Pete Neumann and Ray Orgill.

From 1972 to ‘77, Estancia worked its way onto the Orange County

basketball map. Carlisle compiled 76-66 record in that span, but a 52-23

mark in his final three seasons, including the school’s first league

championship in the sport and 21-6 showing in his final campaign.

Carlisle, the head coach of the South team in the ’77 Orange County

all-star basketball game at Orange Coast College, virtually handpicked

his successor when then-Estancia Principal Floyd Harryman sought his

recommendation.

“I told Harryman, ‘That’s your man for my job right there,”’ Carlisle

said, referring to former Costa Mesa basketball coach Larry Sunderman,

who became a huge success at Estancia from 1978 to ’84.

In the 1975-76 campaign, 6-foot-6 standout Jim McCloskey, who attended

USC on a basketball scholarship, led the Eagles (17-8) to a school record

for victories in a season and the program’s first CIF Southern Section

playoff berth since 1970.

Estancia also won its first-ever playoff game in 1976 with a 57-49

upset victory over Sunset League champion Marina and future Notre Dame

star Rich Branning.

But, in his last season as head coach, Carlisle would make his biggest

splash as the Eagles smashed the school record for victories in a season

(21) and captured the league crown with players like Mike Camp, Greg

Krohnfeldt, Jim Price, Kevin Corbett, Brad Cooper, Orgill and Neumann.

“That (’77 team) was probably the best team we had,” said Carlisle,

who taught science at TeWinkle and U.S. history at Estancia, before

completing a long and distinguished career in the Newport-Mesa School

District at Back Bay High for three years and one more year at TeWinkle.

Carlisle, who has been retired for several years, grew up in

Henderson, Ky., and later played baseball and football at Murray State

University, where he was the quarterback of the Ohio Valley Conference

champions his senior year.

After graduating from high school in 1942, Carlisle spent 2 1/2 years

in the U.S. Army during World War II, serving in the allies’ drive from

Africa to Germany.

After the war, Carlisle started at quarterback for two years at Murray

State, including one year in the Tangerine Bowl at Orlando, Fla. (now the

Citrus Bowl).

Then, Carlisle went to Lakeworth, Fla., to play semipro football. “We

played Ft. Lauderdale for the championship and won,” Carlisle said. “It

was right around 1950 or ’51.”

For three years, Carlisle coached football, baseball and basketball at

Lakeworth High, his first job out of college, then moved to East St.

Louis, Ill., for a football coaching position.

After about five years, Carlisle picked up his family, which included

four children, and moved to California, where the pay scale for teachers

and coaches was higher. He coached baseball and football at Centennial

High in Compton and helped nurture the baseball careers of future major

leaguers Roy White and Reggie Smith.

After three years at Centennial, Carlisle taught one year at

Huntington Beach High, then landed at TeWinkle and stayed in the school

district the rest of his career.

These days, Carlisle enjoys traveling throughout the U.S. with his

wife, Joan, a longtime Estancia teacher and cross country and track and

field coach.

Carlisle drives a truck with a V-10 engine, pulling a boat and 30-foot

trailer in search of the country’s best hunting and fishing spots.

When Carlisle meets new folks on the road and is asked where he’s

from, he simply refers to Costa Mesa as “God’s country.”

Carlisle, the latest honoree in the Daily Pilot Sports Hall of Fame,

has four children and seven grandchildren.