Former Augsburg coach Sam Barber has been hired as the Director of the National Coaches Education Program by USA Wrestling.  See the release below.  Barber was the head coach at Augsburg for the 2007-2008 season before unexpected stepping down in July.  The NCEP Director oversees USA Wrestling’s certification program along with other duties involved with coaching education.

Sam Barber hired as NCEP Manager for USA Wrestling

Augsburg | No Comments »

Bridgewater State College is looking for a part time assistant coach to start immediately.  You can find the job listing on TheMat.com by going here.  Jason York recently took over as the head coach at BSC, which placed 5th at the 2008 NEWA Championships and will have NCAA qualifier Frank Cammisa back as well as an incoming class featuring Massachusetts and New England champion John Sughrue.

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Clint Manny was named to the head coach position at Simpson College in April after Ron Peterson stepped down following 13 years of leading the Storm.  In his time with Simpson, Peterson had the chance to coach Manny to 148 wins, good for the most wins in the rich history of Simpson Wrestling.  A three time All-American and two-time runner-up, Manny became one of the younger coaches in Division III when he ascended from assistant to head coach at his alma mater.

Quite a few head coaches wrestled at the school they now coach, and Manny is one of them.  He has great enthusiasm not only for coaching, but also for Simpson College.  He describes his time at Simpson as a student as some of the best years of his life, and the experience there shaped him into the person he is today.  Taking that to heart, Manny recognizes how he as a coach will help shape the college experience of his wrestlers as they traverse the four years of college.  “The value of the relationships I built at Simpson with my teammates and coaches truly is priceless, and I want to provide those same opportunities for my wrestlers,” Manny states.  He goes on to say, “Ron Peterson has taught me a lot in the last 3 years as an assistant and I’m still learning every day.”
Read the rest of this entry »

Interviews, Simpson | 1 Comment »

Click the link below for a list of all college wrestling tournaments for the 2008-2009 season.  The yellow highlighted items are regular season tournaments hosted by Division III schools.  The green highlighted items are the national qualifying tournaments in Division III.

2008-2009 Tournament List

Here are the host sites for each qualifying tournament:

Centennial - McDaniel
Empire - Oswego
Great Lakes - Concordia (WI)
Iowa - Luther
Metro - York
Midwest - Trine
New England - Springfield
Ohio - Muskingum
Wisconsin - UW-Oshkosh

Concordia-WI, Luther, McDaniel, Muskingum, Oswego, Springfield, Trine, UW-Oshkosh, York | 1 Comment »

Maranatha Bible Baptist College has a vacancy for their head coach position.  Scott Hawes was the previous head coach.  See the job posting here.  Last year, Marantha had their first ever NCAA All-American as junior Ben Hoover placed 2nd at 165 lbs, compiling a 36-2 record in 2007-2008.  Maranatha, located in Watertown, Wisconsin, competes in the Great Lakes Regional.

Coaches, Maranatha | No Comments »

Updated August 29th

d3wrestle.com continues to cover coaching changes in the Division III ranks before the 2008-2009 season gets underway.

There is a vacancy at Maranatha Bible Baptist College.

Schools with New Coaches
Augsburg - Mark Matzek replaces Sam Barber on an interim basis
Bridgewater State - Jason York replaces Derek Coombs
Buena Vista - Sevond Cole replaces Mark Schwab
Pacific - Severin Walsh replaces Scott Miller
Simpson - Clint Manny replaces Ron Peterson
SUNY-Morrisville - Mario Thomas replaces Stan Congden
Waynesburg - Ron Headlee replaces Charlie Heard
Wheaton College - Dan Weber replaces Seth Norton
Wilmington - Carl Amerine replaces Jim Marsh

Current Vacancies
Maranatha - Scott Hawes steps down - job posting

Augsburg, Bridgewater State, Buena Vista, Coaches, Maranatha, Pacific, Simpson, Waynesburg, Wheaton, Wilmington | 5 Comments »

d3wrestle.com has received word that Dan Weber, 2003 NCAA champion at 165 lbs. has accepted the position of Head Coach at his alma mater Wheaton College.  Weber has served as a part time assistant at Wheaton for the past five years and takes over for Seth Norton, who stepped down in June after 12 years as Head Coach.

Weber transferred to Wheaton from Indiana University and spent two years competing for the Thunder.  In 2001, he placed 3rd in Division III at 157 lbs. before moving up to 165 his senior year when he was undefeated on his way to a national championship.  He was Wheaton’s fourth NCAA champion.

As of today, there should be no vacancies in Division III, as Wheaton was the last of nine schools to fill its open position.

UPDATE: See the official Wheaton release HERE

Coaches, Wheaton | No Comments »

Morrisville State College today announced the hiring of Mario Thomas as Head Wrestling Coach.  Thomas comes from Gannon University where he was the assistant for two years.  As a wrestler, Thomas was a 100 match winner for Missouri Valley.  He takes over a team in its third year of provisional Division III membership.  See release below.

Mario Thomas named head wrestling coach

Coaches, Morrisville | No Comments »

49 states have high school wrestling.  Mississippi has been the only holdout after Arkansas started up in the past few years.  Now, according to WLOX, Mississippi is on the verge of starting high school wrestling.  See the link below for more information.  Sure, it’s not DIII wrestling, but this is an idea the whole wrestling community can get behind.

High school wrestling’s coming to Mississippi

Uncategorized | No Comments »

Over the past season, a number of schools changed their web site addresses.  The Division III Team Sites page of d3wrestle.com has been updated to reflect these changes in anticipation of the 2008-2009 season.  If any link ever fails to take you to the right destination, please contact d3wrestle.com with that information.

Uncategorized | No Comments »

Tri-State University has changed its name to Trine University.  They will still be the Thunder and still have 4 returning Midwest Regional Runner-Ups.  The name change was effective August 1st.

Trine | No Comments »

Now that this list is getting pretty big, I will post information at the top here for each update
August 10th - More for Concordia (MN) and full lists for Mount St. Joseph and Stevens Point

This is a list of Division III commitments taken mostly from InterMat’s list of all college commitments for this year. Keep in mind that there are no scholarships or letters of intent in Division III, so none of these commitments are actually set in stone until the wrestlers show up for orientation this fall. Additionally, some of these commitments are dated months ago and could have changed in the interim.

A large number of commitments have gone up since the May 1st deadline, so you will now need to click below to see the full Division III list. Read the rest of this entry »

Augsburg, Central, Chicago, Concordia-MN, Concordia-WI, Dubuque, Elizabethtown, Gettysburg, Heidelberg, Johns Hopkins, Johnson & Wales, Lycoming, McDaniel, Messiah, Mount St. Joseph, Muhlenberg, North Central, Ohio Northern, Olivet, Plymouth State, RIT, Rhode Island, Southern Maine, St. Olaf, Stevens, TCNJ, Thiel, Trine, USMMA, UW-Eau Claire, UW-Lax, UW-Oshkosh, UW-Stevens Point, Ursinus, Wabash, Washington & Jefferson, Washington & Lee, Waynesburg, Wesleyan, Wilkes, Williams, York | 6 Comments »

After 20 years coaching in the area at the high school and middle school level, Ron Headlee moved up to take the reigns at his hometown Waynesburg University.  Following his first year off from coaching as he followed the wrestling careers of his two sons, Headlee did not plan to become a high school head coach again.  However, as Headlee tells it, “God opened the door for me to take over at Waynesburg University.”  Accepting the job in February of this year, he and John Yates, his assistant, set their first goal as filling out the roster in order to avoid the forfeits that have doomed the team in dual meets in recent years.

Click below to read the rest of the interview.
Read the rest of this entry »

Interviews, Waynesburg | No Comments »

Sam Barber has stepped down as head coach at Augsburg College.  Assistant Coach Mark Matzek has been named interim head coach as the national search begins.

Sam Barber Resigns Wrestling Position — Mark Matzek Named Interim Head Coach

Augsburg, Coaches | 3 Comments »

University of Dubuque coach Jon McGovern was featured last week in the Dubuque Telegraph Herald along with former Iowa Hawkeye and current Edinboro assistant Cliff Moore.  The article talks of his transition from competitor to coach following a 4th place finish at the 2000 Olympic trials.

No regrets - Wrestlers Moore, McGovern trade Olympic dreams for family life, coaching

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Cornell Head Coach Mike Duroe is headed to his fourth Olympics as a member of the Team USA Coaching staff this August.  As the article below details, he’s taking on double duties this time.

Cornell’s Duroe draws dual duties as freestyle wrestling coach at 2008 Olympics

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A quick update while I’m at wrestling camp this week and next.

1. Jason York, a former wrestler at Boston University, has been named head coach at Bridgewater State.

2. Morrisville State College, a school soon to join DIII, has a coaching vacancy.

All for now.

Uncategorized | No Comments »

Dustin Carter, a wrestler profiled here on AOL, here in the New York Times, and here on CBS, has committed to wrestle at the College of Mount St. Joseph, as reported in this Cincinnati Enquirer article.  Carter was 40-4 this past season at 103 lbs., qualifying for the Ohio Division II State Tournament.

Links, Mount St. Joseph, Recruiting | No Comments »

The Directors Cup is an accounting of all sports at Division III institutions where points are scored based on NCAA participation.  Williams College won the cup this year for the 10th straight year.  To score points in wrestling, a school must score team points in the NCAA tournament.  Points are given for placing, starting with 100 points to Wartburg for first, all the way down to 21.5 points each for Thiel and Centenary, who tied for 52nd with 0.5 points.

Top Ten Schools with Wrestling Teams

1. Williams
3. TCNJ
6. UW-Whitewater
8. Wartburg
9. Cortland
10. UW-Eau Claire
11. Messiah
14. Ithaca
15. UW-Stevens Point
17. Johns Hopkins

All of these ten except Williams and Johns Hopkins appeared in the last full team ranking of the year, though Williams had two national qualifiers and Johns Hopkins had an All-American for the first time ever.

Directors Cup Website

Uncategorized | No Comments »

Some new video is up on the Video Page, including highlights of the NCAA tournament for Stevens wrestler Brandon MacWhinnie, the first All-American from his school.

While you’re on the video page, be sure to check out the NEWA Championship matches and several college highlight videos.

Stevens, Video | No Comments »