12 Facts About Lyal Clark

Lyal W Clark was an American college football head coach who was Delaware football program's eighteenth head coach.

Lyal Clark graduated in 1929 with a bachelor of arts degree and took his first coaching job that same year as football line coach at the University of Baltimore.

Lyal Clark coached at Harvard until 1946, and was a factor in three Harvard victories over Yale University.

From March 1943 to November 1945, when Harvard suspended its football program during World War II, Lyal Clark served as a lieutenant commander in the United States Navy, as an athletic instructor at the Naval Pre-Flight Training Center in Chapel Hill, North Carolina; at Lakehurst, New Jersey, and at Corpus Christi, Texas.

Lyal Clark returned to Harvard at the end of the 1945 season as Harlow's general assistant.

In March 1946 Lyal Clark left Harvard to take a position on the staff of a former Harvard assistant, Wes Fesler, the new head football coach of the University of Pittsburgh.

Lyal Clark followed Fesler to the Ohio State University when Fesler became the Buckeyes head coach the next year.

Fesler resigned after the 1950 season, and Lyal Clark again accompanied him to another program, this time to the University of Minnesota in 1951.

Lyal Clark served as defensive line coach at OSU for 16 years under Fesler and Hayes, the fourth longest tenure for an Ohio State assistant coach, which included championship teams in 1955,1957, and 1961.

Lyal Clark developed emphysema during this period and retired from Ohio State and coaching before the 1966 season.

Lyal Clark died in 1971 after an extended two-year struggle with the disease.

Lyal Clark was inducted in 1982 into the McDaniel College Sports Hall of Fame.