“Req”

—Pendleton High School Football Coach for 36 Years —

"Football is another classroom where real life lessons are learned." - Don Requa

Don Requa, or Req, as he was known, was an amazing motivator of young people in the classroom teaching mathematics and coaching football. He is remembered as a mentor for everyone he coached. Many credit him with instilling the basic traits that helped make them successful later in life: discipline, a desire to win, teamwork, perseverance, hard work, respect for others, and a love of the game.
Req was the first Oregon High School football coach with over 300 victories and was recognized by the National Football Coaches Association as one of the top ten winning coaches in the country. He amassed records that may never be broken.
· Lifetime record 301-98-6
· Pendleton High School record 273-86-5
· 24 Intermountain Conference Championships
· 25 Oregon State Playoff appearances
· 43 Conferences wins in a row 1960-1966
· By 1984, more wins that any other coach in Oregon
· Oregon Sports Hall of Fame 1985
· National High School Coaches Hall of Fame 1992
· Two time Oregon Coach of the Year
· Selected 15 times to coach Shriner's All-Star teams, on which 65 PHS players participated
· Buckaroo Football Hall of Fame's first inductee 2004

During WWII, First
Lieutenant Requa was a member of the US Fifth Air Force and a co-pilot of a B-24 "Liberator" in the South Pacific. In the Battle of the Bismarck Sea in March 1943, his crew was credited with the sinking of two Japanese Navy vessels. This battle delivered a decisive blow stopping the advance of the Japanese military in the South Pacific.
"Every time I faced a life-threatening moment, I heard Req's voice saying, 'Jimmy, you can do it." - Major James R. Kreutz, former PHS football player and highly decorated helicopter pilot in Viet Nam.
Sculptor: Rip Caswell

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