TEAM NATIONAL CHAMPIONS
Rifle - 1956 National Rifle Association ChampionsThe 1956 Nevada rifle team won the Wolf Pack’s first national championship and becomes just the second team to be inducted into the Nevada Athletics Hall of Fame in its 35-year history. Nevada captured the National Intercollegiate Rifle Championship in Berkeley, Calif., in March of 1956, setting a national record with 1,443 points out of a possible 1,500. The 1956 team included MaxBotz, Gene Espin, Terry Katzer, John Middlebrook, Dick Mills, Bill Rusk and Chuck Taylor and was coached by Sgt. Joel Cantrell. During that 1956 season, the team also won the 31-team Southwest Invitational in El Paso and the Eastern Washington College of Education Invitational. At the prestigious Hearst Intercollegiate Shoot that year, Nevada finished second and won the Sixth Army title. For his efforts, Cantrell was awarded the Army’s Commendation Ribbon with Medal Pendant, one of the top peacetime awards available for meritorious service, while Katzer and Rusk were named All-Americans.
Boxing - 1964 National Collegiate Champions
Boxing - 1968 National Collegiate Champions
Men's Cross Country - 1968 NCAA College Division Champions
The 1968 Wolf Pack men’s cross country team turned in one of the best seasons in school history, winning all of its dual meets. The team capped off its perfect season by winning the 1968 NCAA College Division Cross Country team championship in November in Wheaton, Ill. Freshman Maurice Benn was the individual NCAA champion. One week later, the team captured the 1968 Far Western Conference championship.
The championships were taken away from the Wolf Pack a few months later when the NCAA determined that several of the student-athletes on the team were academically ineligible due to classes they had taken at colleges in England.
Pictured (left to right): Lee Marshall, Henry Kirk, Ray Brown, Pete Sinnott, Peter Duffy, Head Coach Jack Cook, Paul Bateman, Anthony Risby,
Assistant Coach Lloyd Walker. Not pictured: Maurice Benn.
Swimming & Diving - 1979 AIAW Division II Small College ChampionsIn 1979, Nevada’s swimming and diving team captured the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) small college national championship at the Lombardi Rec Center in Reno. It marked the first national championship for a Wolf Pack women’s team, while the squad became the first team of either gender to be inducted into the Nevada Athletics Hall of Fame.
The Wolf Pack headed into the national event with a 13-0 record in dual meets and scored 349 points in the meet which featured 81 teams and 400 participants. The 1979 team roster included student-athletes Ann Belikow, Paige Bryant, Shari Buonomici, Barbara Buck, Connie Gerling, Pam Gordon, Patti Gordon, Janette Jackson, Mary Mirch, Karen Petterson, Gale Reeder, Teresa Roth and Cathy Trachok and head coach Jerry Ballew, assistant coach Loren Cordain and diving coach Clyde Devine.
During the AIAW championship, Belikow scored 77 points individually, winning national titles in the 50, 100 and 200-meter breaststroke. She also set national records in both the 50 and 100 en route to winning Nevada’s first individual national titles by a woman. She was a finalist for the prestigious Sullivan Trophy for the United States’ female athlete of the year following her performance. The team was honored with a commendation from the Nevada Legislature that spring and was congratulated for its “skill, stamina and talent” and its “impressive feat.”
