LANSDALE – Carl Giuranna was decades ahead of his time. He organized community coaches clinics, kept detailed statistics, made strong connections between his team and the community, and oh by the way, won a lot of baseball games in a North Penn uniform. The coach who led North Penn to 253 wins from 1957-1980 and 11 league titles, passed away Sunday morning at the age of 89.

When Hatfield, Lansdale, and North Wales High Schools merged in 1956, it was the start of many new things at the newly minted North Penn High School, and it was then that a young Carl Giuranna began what would be nearly three decades as the skipper of the Knights baseball squad. In those years names like Charlie Prediger, Johnny Corrado, Steve Miller, Dave Livezey, and many others became household names to the area baseball community, but over that span of time, no name was more recognizable to more people than Carl “Go-Go” Giuranna.

“Coach Giuranna was a true throwback to old school baseball- a time when the game was played the way it was supposed to be. He was all about the fundamentals, mechanics, and doing things right. He was also fiercely competitive. It was never a fun bus ride home after a loss,” said 1980 graduate and left handed pitcher Tom Christy.

After graduating from North Catholic High School, he played baseball at the University of Pennsylvania until 1950. At Penn, he played baseball and soccer for four years. After his collegiate career, he was also a professional baseball free agent with the Philadelphia Athletics and the Boston Red Sox, and then became a part time scout for the Phillies for three years, and the Cincinnati Reds for 3 years. He spent many long summer nights at area baseball fields in the southeastern PA area, watching American Legion games and looking for that next pro player.

After coaching at North Penn, Giuranna moved on to West Chester University where he joined his 1980 staff ace Tom Christy and served as pitching coach and then head coach from 1981-1994. And then as he embarked on his golden years, he did what many people do – he went to Florida. Giuranna continued his coaching career in the sunshine state with Flagler College. In the late 1990s Giuranna served as the pitching coach for the Quakertown Blazers of the ACBL, and in the mid 2000s was on the coaching staff with Perkiomen American Legion. If you’re counting, that is over half a century in a baseball uniform.

Tom Nunneviller, Pat Kelly, and John Mabry are among the big names Giuranna coached at West Chester, where he became the head coach in 1987 after the death of then head coach and West Chester icon Neil Serpico, after whom West Chester’s field is currently named.

Bob Bartle, a pitcher on Giuranna’s staff in the early 1970s, who rose to make quite a name for himself in NP baseball history, posted the following on a Facebook thread about Giuranna’s passing:

“The discipline and strong focus on details that he brought to the program not only allowed our team to play at a higher level than we may have otherwise, but also proved extremely valuable to me later in life and throughout my career.”

Alan Warner, a 1980 North Penn graduate and baseball lifer himself, still competing in the Perkiomen Valley Twilight League, fondly remembers baseball homerooms, cheat sheets on the bus rides to games., and post game break downs.

“One guy got a big hit the day before and coach strongly highlighted the point that we didn’t get a bunt down just prior. It was so much fun if you love baseball,” Warner reflected.

Giuranna became the first member of the North Penn Baseball Knights of Fame in 2014, and was inducted into the North Penn Alumni Athletic Association Hall of Fame in its first year in 2005. He is also a member of the Penn Baseball Hall of Fame West Chester University Hall of Fame.