Don Bisesi, the former head coach of the women’s golf team, died at age 77 from cancer.

Bisesi held his role as head coach for 15 years, until early in the fall season when he stepped down into an honorary coaching position.

At that time the team adjusted to a new head coach, LuAnne Howerton, but senior Anastasia Carter said she knew she could still talk to Bisesi about anything.

“He’s always been very encouraging to me and the whole team,” Carter said. “If I’m ever feeling down I can always go to him.”

Carter was one of the two golfers who won GLVC individual titles under Bisesi, Carter in 2014 and Allison Koester in 2015 after she set a 54-hole school record.

Carter said Bisesi was “like a father figure” to her during her four years with the program.

“Coach (Don) Bisesi put his heart and soul into our women’s golf program,” said USI Director of Athletic Jon Mark Hall in a written statement. “Don cared deeply for every student that he coached and he wanted them to achieve all that they could achieve.”

Bisesi is set to enter the USI Athletic Hall of Fame in the spring after leading the university to 10 NCAA Division II East Super Regional appearances in the last 11 years.

With Bisesi as head coach the team qualified together or with an individual player for post-season play for 13-straight years.

He held the title for the GLVC Coach of the Year in 2015 after the team broke a school record at the GLVC Championship.

Bisesi earned his first coach of the year honor in 2011 when he led the women’s golf team to its first conference title.

In August 2005 an issue of Golf Digest ranked Bisesi seventh among Indiana’s golf instructors.
“Coach loved to teach the game of golf and was always ready to help anyone that wanted to improve,” Hall said. “Our women’s golf program garnered national success because of his leadership and the foundation for great things is there now because of him.”

Bisesi was big supporter of junior golf and he co-founded the Evansville Junior Golf Association.

In 1988 he was named Indiana Junior Golf Promoter of the Year.

“As our men’s basketball coach Rodney Watson said, ‘Don was one of the good guys,’ Hall said. “Our entire department will miss him greatly and our thoughts and prayers are with DeLaine and his entire family,”

The funeral service will be held at Alexander West Funeral Home in Evansville, Wednesday (December 23) at 7 p.m. with visitation from 2 p.m. until the start of the service.