Six slated for induction into the Virginia Tech Sports Hall of Fame
Major League pitcher Joe Saunders and PGA Tour golfer Johnson Wagner headline a six-member class selected for induction into the Virginia Tech Sports Hall of Fame.
The six will be inducted at the Hall of Fame dinner held Nov. 15 at The Inn and Skelton Conference Center at Virginia Tech. The university also plans on introducing the group to Tech fans at halftime of the Hokies’ football game versus Maryland the following day.
The six include:
• Saunders, who became the first Tech pitcher to win nine games or more in three consecutive seasons and who also earned all-conference honors three straight years. His 27 wins rank third all-time at Tech, and he became the Hokies’ highest draft pick ever when the Anaheim Angels selected him with the 12th pick in the first round of the 2002 draft.
• Wagner, who was the Atlantic 10 Rookie of the Year in 1998-99 and won the Big East’s individual title as a senior in 2002. His scoring average of 73.97 was a school record at the time and still ranks sixth on the all-time list.
• Bobby Beecher, a basketball standout who still ranks third at Tech in career blocked shots (170) and is in the top 10 in career rebounds (797), field goals made (640) and free-throw percentage (.807). He was the Metro Conference Freshman of the Year in 1983.
• Clarisa Crowell, a softball star who doubled as a pitcher and position player. She still ranks second in winning percentage (.722), third in ERA (1.39) and shutouts (26), ninth in RBIs (103) and 10th in hits (200), doubles (35) and runs (104).
• John Engelberger, who was a second-team All-American in football by The Associated Press in 1999 and ranks in the top five all-time in sacks (26.5), tackles for loss (25) and total tackles behind the line of scrimmage (51.5).
• Jimmy Milley, a tennis stalwart whose 27-2 record in 1979 still stands as the best single-season finish ever. He earned the first national ranking for a Tech player at No. 20 that year.
Johnson rounds out staff
Tech men’s basketball coach James Johnson promoted Andy Moore to assistant coach and named Rob Harris as his director of men’s basketball operations in moves made over the summer. The staff juggling came about after Mark Byington left to take over as the head coach at Georgia Southern.
Moore spent his first season at Tech as the director of men’s basketball operations after spending four years at Eastern Michigan. His other stops included stints as an assistant at Bowling Green (2007-08) and Michigan (2002-07). Moore played his college ball at Muskingum College, earning first-team All-America honors and conference player of the year honors his senior season. He moves into Byington’s role on the staff.
Harris spent this past year as the AD at Charlottesville [Va.] High School. Prior to that, he spent 12 seasons as the head coach at Shenandoah University in Winchester, Va. He led the Hornets to two second-place finishes and two third-place finishes in the Dixie (and later USA South) Conference. In 2003, he was named Dixie Conference Coach of the Year. The Washington, D.C., native played at Shenandoah and received his undergraduate degree in mathematics in 1991 and his master’s in business administration in 1995.
Wolff brings in two to fill out his staff
Tech women’s basketball coach Dennis Wolff brought in two new assistant coaches over the summer to fill out vacancies on his staff.
Wolff hired Bett Shelby and Jermaine Woods to replace Chantelle Anderson and Billi Godsey (who left to take the head job at Iona). Shelby served as an assistant coach at Seton Hall for the past two seasons, where she coordinated aspects of recruiting, scouted opponents and coached the guards. She also spent time as an assistant at Southern Illinois, Tennessee Tech and East Carolina. She played two seasons at UNC Wilmington and two at Greensboro College.
Woods comes to Blacksburg after spending the past three seasons as the head coach of the girls team at Maury High School in Norfolk, Va. Prior to his coaching days, he was a standout at Christopher Newport University. He set Christopher Newport’s record for 3-pointers made as a junior and broke the record again as a senior in 2003. He followed up his time at Christopher Newport by competing professionally in Poland. The Virginia native graduated from Norfolk State with a degree in business management in 2011.
