Takedown Report

Championship Wrestling Coaches – All Divisions

Championship Wrestling Coaches – NCAA Divisions I, II, III, NAIA & NJCAA
In previous articles we have looked at a listing of the coaches who have led their college teams to national championships.  They were ranked by most championships within a division.  This list looks at the coaches ranked with all of their championships combined.  With teams tying for championships and those with two coaches as co-head coaches the total number of championships tops 320 titles.
Dan Gable won 15 titles while leading the University of Iowa in just 21 seasons.  Gable won championships in over 70 per cent of his seasons as head coach.  This was after a stellar career as a wrestler and assistant coach for their in-state rival, Iowa State.   David James won all 12 of his titles at Central Oklahoma State.  The first five were in the NAIA and the rest in the NCAA Division II after the school transitioned its’ affiliation.  James won these titles in a 34 year career with championships in over 1/3 of his seasons. 
E.C. Gallagher is third with 11 championship titles with Oklahoma State in just 23 seasons, which is a 47.8 per cent of his seasons.  Oklahoma State has more than 1/3 of all Division I titles and the most team championships with 34.    Iowa has the second most with 23.  Jeff Swenson of Augsburg University is 4^th with 10 titles on his own as the head coach.  One could have Jim Miller of Wartburg College tied for 4^th as he also won ten yet three of those were as a co-head coach so we’ll place him at 5^th.  Joe Seay places 6^th with nine titles and he is the first coach that won his championships with two different teams in different divisions.
Art Griffith is the 2^nd Oklahoma State coach in these rankings as he is tied for 7^th with eight championships, from the 1940s and 1950s, with four other coaches.  Vaughn Hitchcock won his eight titles in Division II at California Polytechnic in the late 1960s & early 1970s.  John Owen won eight championships in the NJCAA over a wider span of years with North Idaho College.  Two coaches have won eight titles in the most recent decade.  They are Cael Sanderson in Division I with Penn State and Nick Mitchell in NAIA with Grand View University.  As defending championship coaches both are strong favorites to continue their success.  Mitchell won his 8 in 11 seasons and this 72% rate tops Gable and all other coaches.  Sanderson and Griffith are tied 4^th in percentage with 8 titles in 11 seasons as a head coach.  Sanderson coached three seasons at Iowa State.
Tied for 12^th with seven championships are three coaches with Mike Denney of Nebraska-Omaha in Division II, Myron Roderick of Oklahoma State (their 3^rd coach here) in Division I in the 1950s & 1960s and Eric Keller of Wartburg College in Division III.  Keller is the 2^nd Wartburg coach on this list and three of his titles was when he was a co-head coach with Miller so we will rank him a fraction behind Roderick and Denney.  Keller has a 70% rate as he won seven titles in ten seasons as a head coach. Denney is still an active coach so he could move up.  He is now coaching at Maryville where he started the program  after the A.D. abruptly and unreasonably dropped wrestling at Nebraska-Omaha. Harold Nichols of Iowa State leads three coaches tied for 15th with six titles in the 1960s & 1970s in Division I.  He is tied with two active coaches with championships in the NJCAA.  Luke Moffitt of Iowa Central Community College won most recently in 2017 and Joe Renfro led Northeastern Oklahoma A&M to a championship title in 2018.  Renfro won three titles each at the two schools he coached with Labette Community College in Kansas being his first before moving on to Oklahoma.
Five coaches are tied for 18^th place with five titles each.  Dave Icenhower of The College of New Jersey and Donald Murray of SUNY Brockport won their championships in  Division III.  Joe Parsi won his titles with Lindenwood University in the NAIA.  Two active successful coaches are John Smith at Oklahoma State in Division I and coach Steve Costanza leading the defending Division II championship team at St. Cloud State.
Six coaches are tied for 23^rd with four titles each.   Earl Lynn won four junior college titles in the early 1960s yet records are incomplete on how long he coached there.  Pat Whitcomb at North Idaho College and Rex Branum also won four junior college titles.  Branum split his with two at Lincoln College and two at Lassen College.  Bucky Maughan won four at North Dakota State in Division II before the school moved to Division I.  David Ray won his four titles in the NAIA at Montana Northern while Frank Romano won two in NAIA and two in Division II while at the same school, Notre Dame College as they moved from one division to another
15 Coaches are tied for 29^th with three national championship titles.   The only active coaches are in Division I.   Jim Zalesky and Tom Brands coached Iowa University to three championships each.  Zalesky moved on to coach at Oregon State while Brands leads the Iowa team.  J. Robinson won his at Minnesota University and Port Robertson at Oklahoma University.  Four coaches won their trio of titles in Division II. They are Richard Ulrich at Adams State, Eddie Griffin at Central Oklahoma State, Marc Bauer with Nebraska-Kearney and Larry Kristoff at Southern Illinois-Edwardsville.  John Murray of Ithaca is the only coach to win his with a Division III school.  Three coaches won their titles at a Junior College program.  They are Mark Leen at Garden City, Kansas, when they had a team, Bill Lanham at Northeastern Jr. College in Colorado and Art Kraft at Triton Junior College in Illinois.  NAIA schools have three coaches with championships in Russ Houck at Bloomsburg State, Mike Machholz at Missouri Valley College and Robert “Rummy” Macias at Mankato State with two in the NAIA and the last in Division II.  65 other coaches have one or two championship titles.  Some championship teams from the NCWA, Women’s Teams, California Jr. College and others will be researched and considered to determine if they would be applicable for inclusion in these listings.

II/NAIA Mankato State (Minn.)                   Robert “Rummy” Macias       3           1958           1965
19 coaches are tied for 43^rd with two championship titles.

46 coaches are tied at 62^nd with one championship.

(cl) = the school has closed
(t) = teams tied for the title
 ** = school no longer has a team
(cc) = won title as a co-head coach
  # = active head coach

Championships by school

1^st – Oklahoma State … (34),    2^nd – Iowa Univ. … (23),    3^rd – Central St. Okla. … (15)
4^th –(tie) Wartburg Coll., & North Idaho Coll. … (14),              6^th – Augsburg Univ. … (13), 
7^th – Penn State … (9),        8^th –(tie) Adams St. Coll, Cal. St. POLY SLO, Cal. St. Bakersfield, Grand View Univ., Iowa Central C.C., Iowa State, & Nebr.-Omaha** … (8),
15^th – Oklahoma University  … (7),                      16^th – Montana State-Northern … (6),  
17^th-(tie) Lamar Jr. Coll. (Col.)**, Lindenwood Univ.,  SUNY-Brockport, & T.C.N.J. … (5)
21^st-(tie) Lassen College, Lock Haven University, North Dakota State, Notre Dame College, Southern Oregon State, & St. Cloud State … (4)
27^th -(tie) Bloomsburg, Clackamas Comm. Coll., Garden City Comm. Coll.**, Ithaca College, Minnesota, Minnesota State-Mankato, Missouri Valley Coll., Nebraska-Kearney, Northeastern Oklahoma A&M, Northern Iowa Univ., Portland State**, Southern Illinois-Edwardsville, Triton Junior College … (3)
Eight schools with two championship titles each.
24 schools with one championship title.We welcome input about college wrestling history.  We are compiling a historical record of each year a college has had a wrestling team, their dual meet win-loss record and the name of the head coaches.   

November 18, 2019 - Posted by The TakeDown Report | Uncategorized