The Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level. The conference was originally formed in 1951 as the State Teachers Conference, and was temporarily named the Pennsylvania State Teachers College Conference in 1956 before being assuming its current name in 1964.
Cael Norman Sanderson is an American former folkstyle and freestyle wrestler who is the current head coach of Penn State's wrestling team. As a wrestler, he won an Olympic gold medal and was undefeated in four years of college wrestling at Iowa State (159–0), becoming a four-time NCAA Division I champion (1999–2002).
PennWest Clarion, formally Pennsylvania Western University, Clarion, is a public university in Clarion, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of Pennsylvania Western University. The institution was originally founded in 1867 as the "Carrier Seminary." Prior to adopting its current name in 2022, it had gone by several different names over the course of its history, most recently "Clarion University of Pennsylvania." It now offers associate, bachelor's, and master's degrees, as well as certificate programs and a Doctor of Nursing Practice.
Stephen Matthew Neal is an American former professional football guard who played his entire career for the New England Patriots of the National Football League (NFL). He is a former world champion in freestyle wrestling and two-time NCAA national champion wrestler at Cal State-Bakersfield. He was signed by the Patriots as an undrafted free agent in 2001, and won three Super Bowl rings with the team. He is one of a handful of NFL players who did not play college football.
Chris Pendleton is a former American wrestler who competed collegiately for Oklahoma State University. Pendleton won NCAA Division I wrestling titles at 174 pounds in 2004 and 2005 and was a three-time All-American.
William Wallace Wade was an American football player and coach of football, basketball, and baseball, and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at the University of Alabama from 1923 to 1930 and at Duke University from 1931 to 1941 and again from 1946 to 1950, compiling a career college football record of 171–49–10. His tenure at Duke was interrupted by military service during World War II. Wade's Alabama Crimson Tide football teams of 1925, 1926, and 1930 have been recognized as national champions, while his 1938 Duke team had an unscored upon regular season, giving up its only points in the final minute of the 1939 Rose Bowl. Wade won a total of ten Southern Conference football titles, four with Alabama and six with the Duke Blue Devils. He coached in five Rose Bowls including the 1942 game, which was relocated from Pasadena, California to Durham, North Carolina after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Kerry R. McCoy is an American wrestler and executive director and head coach of the Lehigh Valley Wrestling Club regional training center. He competed at the Olympic Games twice and four times at the World Cup Championships. In college he was a three-time NCAA All-American and a two-time NCAA National Champion. He was the head coach of the University of Maryland's wrestling program for eleven years, stepping down in 2019. In 2014, McCoy was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member.
Jack Leggett is an American college baseball coach. He was recently the head coach of the Clemson Tigers from 1994 to 2015. Under Leggett, the Tigers reached the College World Series six times. As of the end of the 2012 season, he had a career record of 1,224–694–1, with seven conference tournament titles and 23 NCAA tournament appearances. Currently, he operates as an associate for Erik Bakich’s staff at Clemson University.
Samuel "Sammie" Henson is a World Champion wrestler, winning a gold medal in freestyle for the USA at the 1998 FILA Wrestling World Championships, held in Tehran, Iran. He was also a silver medalist at the 2000 Summer Olympics in the freestyle 54 kg category, losing to Abdullayev in the finals of that event, held in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. At the age of 36, he competed at the 2006 FILA Wrestling World Championships held in Guangzhou, China, earning a bronze medal. He was named USA Wrestling's Man of the Year in 1998.
Ronald George Polk is an American professional coach in NCAA Division I college baseball. He was a long-time head baseball coach at Mississippi State and is considered to be the "Father of Southeastern Conference Baseball." Polk compiled one of the most successful winning records, as a coach, in both MSU and Southeastern Conference history. In 31 seasons as an SEC coach he compiled a 1218-638-2 (.656) record. His career record stands at 1373-702-2. He currently ranks 9th on the all-time wins list nationally for 10+ year Division I coaches. His teams won five SEC championships and five SEC tournament championships. His teams participated in the NCAA tournament twenty-three times, and reached the College World Series eight times.
Cliff Ellis is an American former college basketball coach, who finished his career as the head coach at Coastal Carolina University. Ellis finished his career as the ninth winningest coach in NCAA Division I history.
The 1981 Clemson Tigers football team represented Clemson University in the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) during the 1981 NCAA Division I-A football season. The Tigers were led by head coach Danny Ford and played their home games in Memorial Stadium. Clemson finished their undefeated 1981 season with a 22–15 victory over the #4 Nebraska Cornhuskers in the 1982 Orange Bowl, and were voted #1 in the Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI) polls.
Established in 1999, both Schalles awards, one for the best collegiate pinner in America and the other, for the best scholastic pinner, are annually presented by WIN Magazine, Cliff Keen Athletics and the NWCA. The award is named after Wade Schalles, one of American wrestling's most storied pinners and a Distinguished Member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. During his collegiate career (1970-1974) Schalles set the NCAA record at 109 pins.
Michael Noonan is a retired American soccer player who played professionally in the American Indoor Soccer Association and is currently the head coach of the Clemson University men's soccer team.
Roger Kish is an American wrestler and the current head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners wrestling team. A native of Lapeer, Michigan, Kish was a four-time Michigan state wrestling champion. Kish is currently tied for ninth all time on the Michigan high school single season win record list. He is second all time on the MHSAA career wins compiling a record of 252-2. Kish went on to become only the 11th four-time champion in MHSAA history. His performance in 2003 earned him the Junior Schalles Award for top high school pinner. He next wrestled at the University of Minnesota, compiling a career record of 117-27. As a sophomore and a junior in college, he finished 2nd at the national tournament. After leaving the University of Minnesota, Kish became an assistant wrestling coach at North Dakota State University. He was hired as the head coach at North Dakota State in 2011 and became the youngest NCAA Division I head coach in any sport.
The Clarion Golden Eagles wrestling team represents PennWest Clarion in Clarion, Pennsylvania in wrestling.
Jacob Stephen "Jake" Varner is an American wrestler. Varner won the gold medal in the 96 kg category at the 2012 Summer Olympics in freestyle wrestling.
The 1972 NCAA University Division Wrestling Championships were the 42nd NCAA University Division Wrestling Championships to be held. The University of Maryland in College Park, Maryland hosted the tournament at Cole Field House.
Donald Ericcson Leas was an American gymnast, diver and diving coach who dove for the University of Michigan and coached diving at the Clarion University of Pennsylvania from 1966 to 1990. Divers trained by him won 36 individual national championships and posted 234 All-America placings. He chaired USA Diving, AAU Diving, and the USA Diving Rules Committee. He was selected in 1999 to receive the Paragon Award by the International Swimming Hall of Fame.
Dave Hrovat was a competitive diver and coach who dove for Clemson University and coached diving at the Clarion University of Pennsylvania from 1990 to 2021, where he led his teams to 48 individual championship titles and 294 All-American finishes.
