PV's Harris showed natural leadership skills in athletics

Willie Harris was besieged with bad luck during his football career and its aftermath.

Harris might have been one of the best-known players of his era except for playing for the wrong team in the wrong era.

His records might have stood out had they survived the destruction of one school building.

According to his coach and teammates, though, Harris, who graduated from Pymatuning Valley in 1969, was one of the best athletes the school ever boasted. He will be inducted into the Ashtabula County Touchdown Club posthumously Sunday at SPIRE Academy

His coach, Thaddeus Kiesnowski, coached the Lakers for only two years, Harris’ junior and senior seasons.

PV was way out of its league in the Northeastern Conference, half or less the size of most of the other schools.

“Willie was on the field the majority of the game as a running back and linebacker,” Kiesnowski said. “He was 235 or 240 pounds. If Willie had played in a league of schools Pymatuning’s size, he would have been more dominant. But we played Ashtabula, Conneaut, Geneva. We were way over our heads.”

Bill Warner, one of Harris’ teammates, said, “I played with Willie Harris in my junior year. He was a senior. He was the perfect example of a gentle giant a big, strong, powerful runner, yet wouldn’t hurt a flea.

“He refused to quit. I remember a play once where he was running a power play up the middle. He broke through the front line dragging tacklers behind him. As he broke into the secondary, four tacklers converged on him. I was the halfback and was sent wide and watched the play from the rear. I truly believed he would be stopped by the four guys trying to bring him down, but to my amazement he dragged them 10 more yards before going down.”

Harris made all-NEC and All-Ashtabula County football teams, but he won more awards in individual sports, especially wrestling.

“Maybe his best sport was wrestling,” Kiesnowski said. “In two years, he lost four matches.”

Harris won the NEC heavyweight championship his senior year.

“Willie was a great athlete, excelling in football, wrestling, and track [weight] events,” Warner said. “He had numerous records in all three sports, making the all county teams in everything he played.”

One of the few records that survived the change of schools was the four touchdowns he scored in seven games in 1967, a year the Lakers went 1-6.

Harris was voted first-team All-Ashtabula County as a linebacker in his junior season.

“One of the few kids I’ve coached in 15 years that, I believe, can play Ohio State football,” Kiesnowski said at the time. “Our best defensive player, best tackler, best blocker and best runner, as a linebacker and football hasn’t yet reached his full potential. But he is a natural leader, unusually strong for his size. [He] likes to play and hit people.”

Harris also suffered from his team’s lack of success in the NEC.

“We never did anything,” Kiesnowski said. “We only had about 35 kids. My introduction to football in the county was playing Ashtabula. They had so many players, they had to dress in shifts.”

He also had only one assistant, Andy Isco, who went on to become a Hall of Fame coach at Ashtabula Harbor.

Kiesnowski was fired after his third year, which was Harris’ senior season. He went on to have a very successful career as a wrestling coach.

In fact, he won eight state championships in Nokesville, Virginia in that sport.

According to Warner, Harris “went on to play football at Edinboro University, but decided to join the Air Force after several months.”

Harris had a long, successful career in the Air Force, serving from 1971-1995.

He died in 1998, from natural causes, at the young age of 47.

Harris was married and had one daughter, Shayla Cojocaru, who now lives in California.

“Willie Harris is very well deserving of being inducted into the ACHOF [Ashtabula County Hall of Fame],” former Pymatuning Valley and Jefferson head coach Jason Root said. “He was undoubtably the best athlete that ever played for PVHS.

“It is a shame that Willie was overlooked over the years. I’m sure the lack of football and personal records and PVHS losing seasons had much to do with it. Willie truly belongs in the ACHOF. I’m very proud to be part of the process that gets him there.”