Career
Bob Burton earned a bachelor"s degree in social sciences from Fresno State in 1968, and a master"s degree from Cal Poly in 1969. After earning his degrees, Burton spent the next three years bouncing around, as an assistant coach at Cal Poly, Leigh High School in San Jose, and Westmont High School in Campbell. In 1972, took the head coaching job at Willow Glen High School in San Jose, compiling a 143-52 record in eight seasons there.
Burton left Willow Glen in 1980 to become head coach at West Valley College in Saratoga.
Burton spent the 1986-1987 season as an assistant coach on a Utah team which reached the National Institute of Technology, but returned to West Valley the next year. In all, he spent 21 years as head coach of West Valley, compiling a record of 488-158.
Burton was coach of the Year for his conference nine times, and for the entire state of California four times. He had only two losing seasons.
Burton left West Valley for good in 2002, to be an assistant coach under Ray Lopes at Fresno State.
He was inducted to the California Community Colleges Coaches Hall of Fame in 2004. Burton was named Fullerton"s head coach on June 6, 2003, replacing Donny Daniels, who left the program to become an assistant at University of California, Los Los Angeles
The Titans struggled throughout Burton"s first year as they compiled an 11-17 record, even with Pape Sow, (who would go on to the National Basketball Association) and Bobby Brown, (who would become the Titans" all-time leading scorer and would also reach the National Basketball Association) on the squad. In the 2004-2005 season, the team showed vast improvement as Burton"s squad went 21-11 and reached the third round of the National Institute of Technology. The 2005-2006 season, the team finished with a disappointing 16-13 record, but they rebounded in 2006-2007 for a 20-10 season, marking the first time since 1985 that the Titans had three consecutive winning seasons.
The Titans thus earned a bid to the National Collegiate Athletic Association Tournament as a 14-seed, the programs first appearance in the tournament since 1978.
They were defeated by Wisconsin in the first round, 71-56. Burton resigned on June 22, 2012 after nine seasons.
His final record at Fullerton was 155-122.
