Committee likes UTC wrestling choices

The search committee charged with helping find a new wrestling coach for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga got its first look at the field of applicants Monday.

"Of the 25 people that applied, there are some very serious candidates," committee chairman Jeff Rufolo said Monday. "There are young assistant coaches who are ready to lead and head coaches at other schools that are looking at the position. We feel like we have the Joe Montanas and Michael Jordans of wrestling applying for the job."

The university closed the application process Friday.

At their meeting Monday afternoon, committee members were asked to submit their top prospects from the list of applicants to UTC athletic director Rick Hart by the end of this week. The committee will meet again next Monday and try to determine the top three or four candidates so Hart can begin scheduling interviews.

Hart has emphasized that the program had grown in stature, and more than one committee member heartily endorsed that belief.

"When we hired Terry Brands, there were three or four serious candidates," Rufolo said. "The number and quality have gone up."

Brands, who was hired in 2002, left to take a position at the U.S. Olympic training facility in Colorado Springs, Colo., and is now assistant coach at Iowa. He was replaced by Joe Seay, who lasted a year before giving way to then assistant coach Chris Bono, who was lured away from an assistant head coaching position at Iowa State.

After taking the Mocs to three consecutive Southern Conference championships and getting UTC into the national top 10, Bono resigned as UTC's coach to return to Iowa State and resume the position he held four years ago.

Bono is running camps at UTC and will remain at the school through next Tuesday, but several committee members were impressed with the list of possible successors.

"It is a diverse group," said Jake Yost, like Rufolo a former Mocs wrestler. "We have top-tier world-class athletes, including former U.S. Olympic team members, and the young, up-and-coming assistant coaches."