After enduring a 33-month battle with leukemia, Brandy Pugh died March 15, 1999 at Swedish Medical Center, where he was born in 1966. Pugh was well-known in Eastside baseball circles.

Pugh grew up in Redmond and played baseball for Lake Washington High school, leading the Kangs to the state semi-finals his senior year. Pugh spent a year playing for Bellevue Community College in 1986, before spending the next year as a wide receiver for Wenatchee Valley College. Pugh then moved on to Portland State to play baseball in 1990 and 1991.

After he graduated in the spring of 1991, Pugh returned to Kirkland and began coaching at Rose Hill Junior High, the same junior high he attended. Along with serving as head football and baseball coach, Pugh was an assistant baseball coach for O’Dea High School in 1994 and Eastside Catholic in 1995. He was hired as Mercer Island’s head baseball coach in 1996.

Shortly after completing his first season as the Islander’s head coach, Pugh was diagnosed with Leukemia. In February of 1997, Pugh received a non-related bone marrow transplant and followed with treatments at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and Virginia Mason Medical Center. He continued coaching at Rose Hill and was cancer-free until December of 1998. Pugh passed away the next March at the age of 32.