Football: WV Sportswriters Honor Nehlen
April 09, 2006 10:44 AM | General
April 9, 2006
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| Don Nehlen |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Don Nehlen, who retired in 2001 as West Virginia University’s winningest head football coach, has been elected to the West Virginia Sports Hall of Fame.
He will be inducted on Sunday, May 7, at the West Virginia Sports Writers Association’s 60th annual Victory Awards Dinner to be held at the Lakeview Resort and Conference Center here. That fete honoring high school and college athletes and coaches will begin at 4 p.m.
In making the announcement Saturday night, WVSWA executive secretary-treasurer Doug Huff said Nehlen will become the 161st member of the shrine which is located in the Charleston Civic Center.
Nehlen, a native of Canton, Ohio, posted a 149-93-4 record during his 21 years at WVU. Counting his 53-35-4 mark for nine years at Bowling Green, his career record of 202-128-8 ranked him fifth among active coaches when he retired.
He guided WVU teams to 17 winning seasons and 13 bowls. His 1988 and 1993 teams are still the only undefeated/untied clubs in the school’s history.
West Virginia won the Lambert Trophy as Eastern champion both of those years and also captured the school’s first Big East championship in ’93.
Last Dec. 6 Nehlen was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in New York City. He’s also a member of the WVU, Bowling Green, Gator Bowl, Mid-American Conference and Canton, Ohio, Baseball Old-Timers halls of fame.
But he admittedly is delighted to add this latest honor to his growing list.
“It’s important to me because of the fact that we decided about 1986 or 1987 to make West Virginia our home,” he explained. “We had many opportunities to leave. But we just loved the state of West Virginia.
“So to be able to go into this hall of fame means a lot to me.”
Nehlen coached 15 All-America first-team selections and six made Academic All-America first teams. Eighty-four standouts earned all-conference recognition. Eighty-three of his pupils went on to play professional football.
He was a consensus choice as national coach of the year in 1988, an honor bestowed by four prestigious organizations. He also was selected as 1989 Playboy Magazine All-America coach.
While at WVU, Nehlen was picked to serve postseason coaching stints in the Blue-Gray, East-West Shrine and Hula Bowl all-star games. In 1997 he served a year as president of the American Football Coaches Association, which had 10,000 members.
It was the smashing success early in his tenure that he hoisted Mountaineer football into a position of national prominence, where it remains under successor Rich Rodriguez who played for Nehlen from 1981-84.
Since his retirement after the 2000 season, Nehlen has served as an adjunct instructor for athletic coaching education in the WVU School of Physical Education. An endowment in his honor also was set up for a visiting lecturer in coaching to speak here annually.
Nehlen has received numerous other awards and honors throughout his career.
After coaching at Bowling Green, his alma mater, he served a three-year assistantship at Michigan under the legendary Boo Schembechler. He was recruiting coordinator and quarterback coach for the Wolverines.
He has said that the thing he’s proudest of most is that, to his knowledge, there never was an NCAA rules infraction during his stay at either WVU or Bowling Green.
Nehlen and wife Merry Ann have two grown children, Danny and Vicky. He is married to the former Janie Gorda and she to former WVU and NFL quarterback Jeff Hostetler.
The Nehlens, who live in the Cheat Lake area just outside Morgantown, also have five grandchildren. Those are Jason, Justin and Tyler Hostetler and Ryan and Danielle Nehlen.
