Hall of Fame
Dave Zeller held his last position as head basketball coach at Piqua Central High School. He earned three basketball letters and was all-Mid-American Conference guard under Coach Dick Shrider. He played with the professional Cincinnati Royals through the 1961-62 season; returned to help Shrider as a graduate assistant in 1962-63. He started out with six seasons at Northeastern High School near Springfield and then went to coach at Piqua. His teams have won three Mad River Valley League championships at Northeastern and two titles at Piqua in the old Miami Valley League which preceded the present Miami Central Conference. His products include Bernard Newman.
As an undergraduate Zeller helped lead Miami to a Mid-American co-championship with Bowling Green in 1959. He ranked second in Miami scoring that season with 13 points a game; second again in 1959-60 with 12.9. As a senior, he led both Miami and the MAC with 22.3 a game for the season and 22.9 in conference play. He also led the MAC in free-throw shooting with 91 of 103 for .883. He shares with Hall-of-Famer Wayne Embry Miami's season record for free throws made: 172, in 1979. His career marks include being third in free throws made (329); third in free throws attempted (432); fifth I points average (16.3); sixth in free throw percentage (.762) and 13th in scoring (1,079), in 1979. Zeller, whose home was Medway, entered Miami from the same high school that sent Embry to Miami Tecumseh, at New Carlisle. He was inducted into the Miami Hall of Fame in 1979.
