Inductees
Joe Seay
Year: 2021
Gender: Male
About Joe:
April 29, 1939 – July 11, 2019
After leading his teams at Cal State-Bakersfield and Oklahoma State to a total of nine NCAA championships, Joe Seay then coached the USA to milestone victories in the Goodwill Games, World Championships and Olympic Games.
A 1964 graduate of Kansas State, Seay wrestled there three years and later won three national Greco-Roman crowns while placing second twice in Freestyle.
But it was as a coach at all levels that he earned lasting renown.
Starting with eight years at Bakersfield South High in California, he compiled a record of 177-12-2 and was national high school Coach of the Year. Moving across town to Cal State, he coached a dozen years and won seven Division II national championships with a record of 189-56-2. At Oklahoma State, from 1985 to 1992, he went 114-8-2 with back-to-back Division I crowns in 1989 and 1990.
His folkstyle record adds up to 480 victories and an .859 winning percentage. He is the only coach to win collegiate team titles in both divisions, and he was named national Coach of the Year five times.
When his collegiate coaching career ended in 1992, Seay quickly stepped into a major role on the international scene. Already closely affiliated with the Sunkist Kids program, he became their head coach and continued the club’s still unbroken streak of national freestyle championships.
He coached the USA to its first-ever Senior World Freestyle championship in 1993 and repeated two years later, also leading a Pan American Games victory in 1995. And at the Centennial Olympics in Atlanta, Seay’s wrestlers won the medal count.
As a coach who has left an indelible mark on all levels of the sport, Joe Van Seay is honored as a Distinguished Member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.