With 15 WPIAL football championships and 11 boys basketball titles, Aliquippa High School is known as a two-sport school. But Natalino Palombo represented a different era. As a senior in 1946, he helped lead the Quips to their second — and last — WPIAL championship as an infielder. It preceded a long and fruitful career as both a baseball player and a coach.
Mr. Palombo, or “Coach Nalie,” as he was referred to by the hundreds of youths he coached, passed died Sunday at the age of 89 at Allegheny General Hospital. He leaves behind a legacy as not only a former baseball coach and player, but also as a community leader, devout Catholic and die-hard Quips fan.
