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| Born | February 9, 1950 (age 74) Pumphrey, Maryland, U.S. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Country | United States | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Wrestling | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Event(s) | Freestyle and Folkstyle | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| College team | Navy | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Team | USA | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Lloyd Weldon "Butch" Keaser (born February 9, 1950) is an American former wrestler who competed in the 1976 Summer Olympics for the United States in freestyle wrestling. In 1973, he won a gold medal at the World Championships and became the first African American to achieve this honor.
Keaser was born in Pumphrey, Maryland. He wrestled for the United States Naval Academy and was a two-time NCAA All American, placing fourth as junior and third as a senior. He was an alternate on the 1972 USA Olympic team to Dan Gable. In 1973, he won a gold medal at the World Championships and became the first African American to achieve this honor. In 1976, he won the silver medal at the Montreal Olympics in freestyle wrestling. Keaser is now the wrestling coach at Wilde Lake High School in Columbia, Maryland.
In 1996, Keaser was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member. [1]
Danny Mack Gable is an American former folkstyle and freestyle wrestler and coach. Considered to be one of the greatest wrestlers of all time, Gable is a two-time NCAA Division I national champion, a world gold medalist, and an Olympic gold medalist. Gable was only the third wrestler to be inducted into the United World Wrestling's Hall of Fame in the Legend category. In 2014, Gable was inducted into the International Sports Hall of Fame and awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2020.
John William Smith is an American folkstyle and freestyle wrestler and coach. Smith was a two-time NCAA Division I national champion, and a six-time world level champion with two Olympic Championships and four World Wrestling Championships. Smith is the only American wrestler ever to win six consecutive World and Olympic championships as a competitor. At the end of his competitive career, Smith had won more World and Olympic gold medals in wrestling than any other American. Smith was widely known for his low single leg takedown, and is considered one of the greatest freestyle wrestlers of all time.
Shirley Frances Babashoff is an American former competition swimmer, Olympic champion, and former world record-holder in multiple events. Babashoff set six world records and earned a total of nine Olympic medals in her career. She won a gold medal in the 400-meter freestyle relay in both the 1972 and 1976 Olympics, and she won the 1975 world championship in both the 200-meter and 400-meter freestyle. During her career, she set 37 national records and for some time held all national freestyle records from the 100-meter to 800-meter event.
Daniel Allen Hodge was an American amateur and professional wrestler, who also had a brief professional boxing career. He is in both the U.S. amateur wrestling Hall of Fame, for his three NCAA titles and Olympic silver medal, and the pro wrestling Hall of Fame, as a seven-time NWA World Junior Heavyweight Champion. The Dan Hodge Trophy is the college wrestling equivalent of the Heisman Trophy.
James "Chico" Hernandez is an American martial artist who competes in the sport of Sambo. He was the first Sambo champion to be featured on a box of Wheaties Energy Crunch and CNN/SI "Faces In the Crowd".
Stanley Joseph Dziedzic Jr. is an American former welterweight freestyle wrestler.
Benjamin Lee "Ben" Peterson is a retired American freestyle wrestler. He competed at the 1972 and 1976 Olympics and won a gold and a silver medal, respectively. As a college wrestler, Peterson was a two-time NCAA champion at Iowa State. He founded the "Camp of Champs," which brought in Olympic wrestlers to train with high schoolers. Peterson also coached wrestling at Maranatha Baptist University for 28 years.
The Oklahoma State Cowboys wrestling team is the most successful NCAA Division I athletic program of all time in any sport. As of 2023-24, Oklahoma State wrestling has won 34 team national championships, 143 individual NCAA championships, and 488 All-American honors. The all-time dual record for the program is 1185-140-23.
Leslie Lyle Gutches is an American former wrestler and coach. His accomplishments include becoming a World Champion in freestyle wrestling at the 1997 World Wrestling Championships, the Dan Hodge Trophy as the nation's best college wrestler in 1996, becoming the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) champion in the 177 lb. weight division in both 1995 and 1996, earning All-American status in 1994, 1995 & 1996, becoming a member of the 1996 United States Olympics freestyle wrestling team and winning numerous other tournaments and honors.
John "Jonty" Alexander Skinner is a former Hall of Fame South African competition swimmer and world record-holder, who for over forty years served as an American club and college swimming coach primarily at his alma mater, the University of Alabama before retiring as a coach in 2020. He coached the US national team in the mid-1990s, remaining as a Director of Team Performance through 2008.
Bruce MacFarlane Furniss is a former American amateur competition swimmer, Olympic double gold medalist, and ten-time world record-holder in four events. At the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec, he won the Men's 200-meter Freestyle and was a member of the winning U.S. team in the Men's 4×200-meter Freestyle Relay, both in world record time. Furniss broke ten world and nineteen American records, and won eleven Amateur Athletic Union and six NCAA titles.
Harry Geris was a Canadian Olympic wrestler who represented Canada in the 1968, 1972, and 1976 Olympics, 1966 British Empire and Commonwealth Games and 1975 Pan American Games.
Ivan Sergeyevich Yarygin was a Soviet and Russian heavyweight freestyle wrestler. Between 1970 and 1980 he won all his major international competitions, except for the 1970 and 1974 European championships where he placed second. Yarygin was an Olympic champion in 1972 and 1976, being the first wrestler to go through an Olympic competition with straight pin victories and no foul points, a world champion in 1973, a World Cup winner five times, has never lost a single match in World Cup competition, and a European champion in 1972 and 1975–76, and won a world cup in 1973, 1976–77 and 1979–80. He also set a record for the fastest pin victory in the World Cup history at 27 seconds. After retiring in 1980, he headed the Soviet freestyle wrestling team from 1982 to 1992 and the Russian Wrestling Federation from 1993 until his untimely death in a car crash in 1997. An exceptional upper-body wrestler, Yarygin was widely regarded for his tremendous physique and high-strength aggressive style, always aiming to pin down his opponents, with most of his stoppage wins came by way of fall achieved through rapid fireman's lift and slamming the opponent to the mat. One of the most prestigious tournaments in the World was put together in his honor - The Golden Grand Prix Ivan Yarygin Tournament is held annually in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, and has the reputation of being one of the hardest tournaments in the World. The Yarygin Memorial annually sees the world's best wrestlers come to Siberia, with the added element that Russia's autonomous oblasts and republics such as Dagestan and Chechnya field independent teams alongside an All-Russia selection.
Henry Wittenberg was an American New York police officer, coach, competitor and Olympic champion in freestyle wrestling. He won two Olympic medals in freestyle wrestling, becoming the first American wrestler since 1908 to achieve this feat. After Army service in the early 1940s, he served with commendations as a New York City Police Officer until around 1954, worked as an instructor and college wrestling coach at Yeshiva and then City College of New York from 1967 to 1979, competed in, coached, and helped to organize the Maccabiah Games, and served as an American Olympic coach in 1968 at Mexico City.
The Iowa State Cyclones wrestling team represents Iowa State University (ISU) and competes in the Big 12 Conference of NCAA Division I. The Cyclones are 8 time National Champions, 17 time National Runners-Up, and have 45 Trophy Finishes. The team is coached by Kevin Dresser. The Cyclones host their home meets at Hilton Coliseum on Iowa State's campus. Iowa State became the second collegiate wrestling program to reach 1,100 dual wins on January 23, 2022.
Leroy (Lee) P. Kemp, Jr. is an American former freestyle and folkstyle wrestler. Kemp would achieve success at the high school, collegiate, and international levels.
Cary Joseph Kolat is an American wrestler and wrestling coach who earned two NCAA championships in 1996 and 1997 for Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania and was a member of the United States Men's Freestyle Wrestling Team from 1997–2001. During that time he won silver and bronze medals at the 1997 Krasnoyarsk and 1998 Tehran FILA Wrestling World Championships, as well as competing for the United States in freestyle wrestling at the 2000 Summer Olympics. In 2017, Kolat was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member. Kolat is currently the head wrestling coach at United States Naval Academy.
Jill Ann Sterkel is an American former competition swimmer, Olympic champion, former world record-holder, and water polo player. Sterkel won four medals in three Olympic Games spanning twelve years from 1976 through 1988. She was the women's head coach of the Texas Longhorns swimming and diving team at the University of Texas at Austin from 1993 to 2006.
Donald Ray "Don" Behm is an American wrestler and coach. He was Olympic silver medalist in freestyle wrestling in 1968.
Anatoly Alekseyevich Beloglazov is a retired Russian freestyle wrestler. He won gold medals at the 1980 Olympics and 1977, 1978 and 1982 World Championships, placing third in 1983. In 2010 he was inducted into the FILA Hall of Fame.
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