Wichita community mourns the death of East high school coaching legend Ron Allen

Ron Allen, a legendary City League basketball player and coach, has died at the age of 71, his family announced on Friday.

“My heart is broken today,” wrote his son, R.J. Allen, the current men’s basketball head coach at Newman, on his Facebook. “My dad was everything to me. Best coach I’ve ever had. He was the ultimate encourager. A legend, I am so thankful for the time we got to spend together. I know he’s in heaven still coaching... yelling out, ‘On the line.’ I would give anything for one more day with you. You will be deeply missed.”

Allen was the coach of the Wichita East high school boys basketball team from 1994 to 2012, compiling a 301-146 record and leading the Blue Aces to the Class 6A state championships in 2002 and 2005. He ranks third all-time among City League coaches in victories.

“I always looked up to coach Allen because he always found a way to keep his children and his wife at the center of what he was doing,” Heights boys basketball coach Joe Auer told The Eagle. “He was a teacher, a coach, a mentor, a family man and he had his priorities in line. He was a tremendous role model for all of us. A gentleman’s gentleman and a competitor’s competitor. He won with class and lost with dignity and he kept his family at the center, which is not easy in the business of teaching and coaching. You see so many coaches sacrifice family time, but coach Allen was a man who figured out how to make his family a central part of his legacy.”

He was also a standout youth basketball player in Wichita and starred for Wichita Southeast before playing at Arizona for Fred Snowden, the first Black coach at a major college program, in the early 1970s.

Allen has been inducted into the Wichita Sports Hall of Fame, as well as the halls of fame at Wichita East, Wichita Southeast and Biddy Basketball.

“He was a great man, a great husband, a great father, a great teacher, a great coach and a great mentor,” said current East boys basketball coach Carlin Whitten, a former player of Allen’s on his state championship teams. “He shaped me into becoming a good basketball player and a good person and he’s the reason why I’m doing what I’m doing today. It’s going to be hard walking into that gym with all those memories we had in there together. He always believed in me and he gave me a chance. I can’t pay him back for how much he did for me.”

This story will be updated.