Dan Boisture

Who was Dan Boisture?

Daniel P. Boisture, Jr. was an American football coach. He was the head coach of the Eastern Michigan Eagles football team from 1967 to 1973, compiling a record of 45-20-3.

Boisture was a star athlete in high school, playing both basketball and football at Holy Redeemer High School in Detroit. He served in the United States Marine Corps in the Pacific Theater during World War II,and was wounded in the Battle of Okinawa, for which he was awarded a Purple Heart. After returning home, he was recruited as a basketball player by Notre Dame, but instead attended the University of Detroit, where he lettered four times in football as an end, and twice in basketball. In 1949, Boisture helped the University of Detroit football team win the Missouri Valley Conference championship in the school's first year in the conference.

Boisture began his coaching career as a high school football coach at Dearborn St. Alphonsus High School and Ecorse St. Francis Xavier High School. From 1954 through 1958, he coached at Detroit St. Mary's of Redford High School in the Detroit Catholic League, where his teams accumulated a 37-4-2 record and won the Catholic League championship four of the five years he coached there. In 1959, at the age of 33, he became an assistant coach at Michigan State University, under Duffy Daugherty, where he stayed through the 1966 season. During his time at Michigan State, the team won two national championships, in 1965 and 1966.