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Saturday, January 21, 2023 | 11:01 AM
Christina Serafini | Tribune Review
Inductees in the 2023 WPIAL Hall of Fame class stand for photos during the Hall of Fame announcement held at the Heinz Historical Center on Wednesday, January 18, 2023. Seen (back, left to right): Bill Palermo, Don Rebel, Bob Osleger, Greg Meisner, Tom Pipkins, Sean McCreary (1981-82 Monaca Men’s Basketball Team), (front row, left to right): 2000-01 Oakland Catholic women’s basketball coaches Susie McConnell Serio, Laura Grimm, Virginia Fronck, Bill Cleary and Larry DeVincentis were on the Monaca men’s basketball team in 1981-82.
North Allegheny alumnus Ray Brinzer will be inducted into the WPIAL Hall of Fame in the 2023 class.
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Ray Brinzer is a computer programmer who writes software and manages databases. While this seems like a world away from his mat wrestling for one of the WPIAL’s all-time greats, the former North Allegheny star sees parallels.
“What I have in common is complexity,” said Brinzer, a 1990 graduate who will be inducted into the WPIAL Hall of Fame this spring. “I couldn’t stand playing a boring sport, and wrestling is an endless well of choices and decisions. Taking advantage of it and learning to navigate its system has been very good for me. Software is similar.”
While winning back-to-back WPIAL and PIAA titles from 1988-1990, his string of good decisions allowed him to win 109 straight games in his final three seasons of high school.
The WPIAL Hall of Fame class was announced on January 18th. The group includes 13 of his individuals and two of his teams and will be inaugurated at a banquet at his DoubleTree in the Green Tree on June 2nd.
“I’m glad they’re still interested because it was very important to me and my friends,” Brinzer said. “I was on a special team. We had an exceptional coach.
Brinzer, 51, is a big part of North Allegheny’s dominant wrestling program, was named a three-time high school All-American, and was named the 1990 Asics High School Wrestler of the Year.
He wrestled in college in Oklahoma and later in Iowa, was a two-time Big Ten Champion at 177 pounds, and won All-American honors in 1993 and 1995. In both years he finished third in the NCAA Tournament and eventually became a national champion.
On the international scale, Brinzer finished runner-up in the US Greco-Roman in 1998 and competed for the national team that year.
Yet Brinzer does not list any of these accolades as his favorite achievement. Brinzer, who was named Cadet Greco-Roman Coach of the Year in 2006 and ran his very successful wrestling club, said his most fulfilling successes were those he achieved as a coach instead. I was.
“Angry Fish did well at the beginning of the century,” said Brinzer. “We have helped athletes like Jake Herbert and Coleman Scott, both of whom have gone on to become world and Olympic medalists. There were a lot of really great athletes in there too.”
Brinzer said he continued coaching consistently until a few years ago when the pandemic disrupted normal life. Now back in western Pennsylvania, he said he’s been away from Matt for the last few years, but he may find a way to rejoin.
“It really felt like we were doing something,” he said of coaching. “It was an opportunity to change people’s lives and they took us on. I don’t think so, we didn’t create them, but we paved the way for them to create their own. “
Brinzer has been involved in wrestling since a young age, in part because his father used to wrestle in Slippery Rock. For him, competing on the mat became a way to focus his youthful energies.
“I was an aggressive, controversial little kid,” he said. “I fought over and over. When I wrestled, I never got in trouble. So, more or less, being as violent as I want to be is an outlet for me.” was.”
Also: Tom Pipkins (basketball) and Greg Meisner (football) of the Valley; Jonathan Hayes (football) of South Fayette; Laura Grimm (basketball) of Serra Catholicism; Emily Carter (swimming) of Bethel Park; WPIAL Hall of Fame of Peters Township A player was also selected. Sarah Riske McGramery (tennis). Two retired coaches, Serra Catholic women’s basketball coach Bill Cleary and her Sto-Rox softball coach Bill Palermo, are also set to take over, along with softball umpire Bob Osleger and her TribLive HSSN broadcaster Don Rebel. .
The late James “Rush” Nesser, former Uniontown men’s basketball coach, was the legacy choice.
Seneca Valley senior Virginia Fronck, who was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma before the fall soccer season, will receive the WPIAL Courage Award.
The teams selected for the introduction were the 2000-2001 Oakland Catholic Women’s Basketball Team and the 1981-82 Monaca Men’s Basketball Team.
Chris Harlan is a staff writer for Tribune-Review. You can reach Chris by email at charlan@triblive.com or on his Twitter. .
tag: Northern Allegheny
