Perhaps one of the greatest tributes to Frank Cignetti Sr. yesterday was the fact that on the day he died, both of his sons, Frank Jr. and Curt, were on the job coaching football. Cignetti Sr., the IUP and College Football Hall of Famer, passed away yesterday at age 84. Pitt offensive coordinator Frank Cignetti Jr. worked the game against Tennessee yesterday, which Pitt lost in overtime. Curt Cignetti, who along with his father became an IUP head football coach, led his current team, James Madison to a 63-7 win over Norfolk State.
Frank Sr., who was also a head coach at West Virginia and an assistant at Pitt, West Virginia, and Princeton, was 182-50-1 at IUP between 1986 and his retirement in 2005. He was the school’s athletic director from 1982 to 1998. He was a graduate of IUP, where he played both football and basketball, and was named to the university’s inaugural Athletic Hall of Fame as a player in 1996.
Cignetti’s IUP teams made the Division II playoffs thirteen times, and made the national semifinals and finals twice.
