Gone, Lost & Forgotten: Their Best = Auburn

Whenever you talk about wrestling in the south there is always a sense of mystique that comes along with it.  Those of us from the Midwest and northeast and even those from the western part of the United States look at it differently than we do wrestling in our parts of the country.  There's a lot of mystery that surrounds it. A lot of questions that get asked. A lot of assumptions that are made.

The thought of wrestling in the south being any good to some is asinine.  Yet in the case of Auburn, they may not have been Dan Gable's Iowa Hawkeyes, but under the leadership of long time coach Swede Umbach the tigers won 25 Southeastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association (SEIWA) conference titles.  Later when the SEC (Southeastern Conference) added wrestling to their athletics, Auburn won four titles out of the twelve conference tournaments that ended up being held.

Another question I get all the time in regards to southern teams like Auburn is whether the squads were made up of local southerners or if in order to be competitive they had to recruit from "Up north."   The answer may surprise you.  Yes, they did get wrestlers from other regions of the states, but there were more wrestlers from the south than what you would think.

The best in Auburn wrestling?   Let's take a look.

118 lbs
Tony Leonino

One of the outsiders that wrestled for Auburn was Tony Leonino who won an Ohio high school state title for Stow Monroe Falls in 1979.  Wrestling for the Tigers he made an immediately impact, placing fourth at the Midlands less than a year after graduating high school.  As a true freshman, he placed seventh at the 1980 NCAA's.  He would qualify again in 1981 and then be forced to find a new home to wrestle at as football coach/athletic director Pat Dye made the announcement that Tiger wrestling would not continue in the 1981-1982 season.  He finished up his career at Kent State.

123 lbs
Tony "Sonny" Dragoin 

Now Sonny Dragoin on the other hand was a native of Alabama. A medic during World War II & a semi-professional baseball player, Dragoin had already lived an interesting life before he came to Auburn to wrestle for Swede Umbach.  During his time at Auburn he won four SEIWA titles and placed fourth at the 1951 NCAA championships.

Post graduation, he stayed on at Auburn where he taught P.E. and coached the men's golf team. He lead the Tigers to SEC titles in 1976 & 1981.  He later became a wrestling official.

Jamie Milkovich 

Another recruit out of Ohio, Jamie Milkovich came to Auburn to wrestle for his older brother Tom.   While competing for the Tigers, Milkovich accumulated 98 victories, placing seventh as a junior at the 1980 NCAA's and fifth as a senior at the 1981 NCAA's. Immediately after graduation he came back to his high school of Maple Heights and took over as head coach of the program.  As last counted Milkovich had 434 dual wins, ninety-four state qualifiers and fifty state place-winners.

134 lbs
Clar Anderson 

Clar Anderson was only a sophomore when Auburn announced that they were discontinuing wrestling. The 1981 All American who finished in sixth place for the Tigers at the NCAA tournament had to find a new home.  He chose Oklahoma State.

Wrestling for the Cowboys, Anderson won a National title as a junior in 1983 after having to sit out the 1982 season due to transfer rules.  In 1984 as a senior he finished in fifth place.

After college, Anderson got into coaching.  He coached the Duke Blue Devils for a long period of time.

177 & 150 lbs
John Stallings

Another southerner, this time from Atlanta, Georgia, John Stallings won four high school state titles for Woodward Academy before coming to Auburn.  Wrestling for the Tigers he qualified for the NCAA tournament three times.  His sophomore season he entered the SEC tournament with a 5-4-1 record, winning the title with an upset victory over a two time SEC champion.

167 lbs
Mike Roberts

Mike Roberts was a four time NCAA qualifier for the Tigers qualifying in 1970, 1971, 1972 nd 1973.

175 lbs
Dan Montrone 

Montrone was an All American for the tigers in 1950, placing fourth at the NCAA championships.

177 lbs
Eli Blazeff 

Yet another victim of Auburn's discontinuation of wrestling, Blazeff placed seventh as a sophomore for the Tigers at the 1981 NCAA championships.  Forced to find a new home after Dye's decision, he transferred to Michigan State.  Wrestling for the Spartans he placed fifth in 1983 as a junior and took third as a senior in 1984.  He won four matches that year, twenty one of them by fall.

190 & 177 lbs
George Calloway

Calloway was a three time SEC champion winning titles in 1972, 1973 & 1974

HWT
Dan McNair 

Whenever anyone asked me who the best wrestler was that I could think of from Louisiana, for years I always answered, "Daniel Cormier."   Then Mark Palmer, one of the head writers for intermatwrestle, wrote an article on Dan McNair of New Orleans.  McNair began wrestling his junior year of high school and during that season, he didn't win a match.  He'd get better.  A lot better.

Wrestling for Auburn, McNair won the 1953 NCAA title.