Campbell University

Don Laird, a starting guard on the 1977 NAIA national runner-up team, was inducted into the Campbell Athletics Hall of Fame on Oct. 7, 1989.  Chosen the team’s best defensive player and a tri-captain on the club that advance to the title game, Laird was presented the Charles Stevenson Hustle Award at the national tournament.
 
Along with fellow Hall of Fame members Sam Staggers and Don Whaley, Laird played on Fighting Camel teams that won no fewer than 23 games over each of his final three seasons and posted a 71-20 record, which stands as the highest winning percentage (.780) over a three-year span in Fighting Camel basketball history.
 
A native of Gloversville, N.Y., Laird graduated cum laude in 1977 as a chemistry major.  He furthered his education at Wake Forest, where he earned his Ph.D. in biochemistry in 1983.  He received a post-doctoral fellowship from Johns Hopkins University.
 
Laird served as a senior research biologist for Monsanto and went on to work as a principal scientist at Abbott Laboratories.