Duquesne HC Keith Dambrot Announces Retirement After Stellar Career

Duquesne head coach Keith Dambrot announced his retirement Monday afternoon in a press conference, ending a stellar career as head coach.

Dambrot, who will turn 66 years old in 2024, coached 36 seasons overall, 32 at the Division I level and 27 overall as head coach. He finishes with a career record of 516-301 (.632) and 240-160 in conference play (.600).

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Most of his reasoning for retirement is not just his age, but also his wife, Donna, who has battled breast cancer this past year. 

The Akron, Ohio native started out as head coach of Tiffin at the Division II level for two seasons, 1984-86, before taking an assistant coach position at Eastern Michigan for three seasons from 1986-89. He then returned to the Division II level at Ashland for two seasons, 1989-91, and would take the head coaching job at Central Michigan.

His coaching tenure at Central Michigan featured him embroiled in controversy and a poor 20-34 record ended his tenure after just two seasons.

Keith Dambrot wouldn’t have a head coaching job again until 1998, when he took over St. Vincent-St. Mary High School in his hometown of Akron. He would lead the team to a 69-10 record in his three seasons with the team and won two state titles his last two years, with future NBA star Lebron James leading the way.

He then took an assistant coaching job at Akron for three seasons, 2001-04, before assuming the head coaching position for the following 13 seasons, 2004-17. Dambrot led Akron to a 305-139 overall record (.637) and 155-65 in the MAC (.705), with 10 postseason appearances, three NCAA Tournaments and five NITs.

Dambrot finished off his career spending the past seven seasons at Duquesne, the school where his father played for some great teams in the early 1950s.

He has a 103-92 overall record (.528) and 48-62 in A-10 play (.436) over that time. His greatest achievement came on Sunday, as the Dukes defeated the VCU Rams in the A-10 Championship Game, putting themselves into the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 47 years.

Following the NCAA Tournament, which Duquesne starts with a game in the First Round against No. 6 BYU Thursday afternoon in Omaha, Neb., the program will look to a new successor. Dambrot has insisted on Dru Joyce III, his associate head coach and who played on those St. Vincent-St. Mary’s teams with James.