Former Clarion Coach Has Dedicated Life to Sport of Wrestling
By Matt Krumrie – Senior Editor
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Bob Bubb was basking in the warm Florida sun at his daughter’s Vero Beach home in mid-February, looking out into a channel as million-dollar yachts cruised by him.
“Amazing some of these boats that come by,” Bubb said. “It’s beautiful down here. It’s a different world, different life.”
It’s a life far away from the one that Bubb knows, far away from a life that saw him succeed in numerous capacities in the sport of amateur wrestling, resulting in his recent election as a Distinguished Member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. Chris Campbell, Zeke Jones and J Robinson also were elected as part of this year’s class.
“This has all been a very humbling experience,” Bubb said. “To be elected to this hall of fame is the equivalent of being elected to Cooperstown for the baseball hall of fame, and Canton, for the football hall of fame. In our sport, this is the top. I am very honored.”
While Bubb may go about his daily duties on vacation in Florida in relative anonymity ” just how he likes it ” the Clarion resident is a household name in the small Pennsylvania town, and especially in the world of collegiate wrestling.
Bubb made his largest impact as the head coach at Division I wrestling power Clarion, where he became only the fourth NCAA coach to have more than 300 career dual meet wins. Since retiring from coaching, Bubb has been actively involved in the sport, serving as executive director of the National Wrestling Coaches Association and the NCAA wrestling secretary-rules editor. While he retired from the former in 1999 after three and a half years, he is still actively involved in the latter.
In fact, earlier in the day while he was peering out looking at those yachts, he was on the phone with NCAA Wrestling Rules Committee members figuring out a protest of a call that occurred during the Nebraska-Oklahoma State dual on February 10.
“I’m still involved,” Bubb said. “But I’m more behind the scenes, and that’s fine with me.”
Bubb was the head coach at Clarion from 1967 to 1992, where he posted a 322-121-4 dual meet record. Clarion placed fourth at the NCAA championships in 1973, sixth in 1972 and 1987, and eighth in 1992. His teams won 11 Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) titles and an Eastern Wrestling League title. His teams were in the NCAA top 20 for 12 years and in the top 25 for 19 years.
Two of the top individual student-athletes to compete for Bubb at Clarion are fellow members of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame: Kurt Angle and Wade Schalles. Angle won two NCAA titles under Bubb (1990 and 1992) and went on to be a 1995 world champion and 1996 Olympic champion. Schalles was an NCAA champion in both 1972 and 1973, and was the NCAA’s most outstanding wrestler in 1972.
When reminded of his remarkable accomplishments, Bubb was quick to point out that he was not the only person behind that success.
“In many ways I think I was simply the conductor of an orchestra,” Bubb said. “An orchestra has a lot of instruments and people who must perfect playing those instruments to succeed. In wrestling there are a variety of people who must play their part to succeed. I look at my wife, my family, my assistant coaches, the administration and the student-athletes that wrestled for me, they did their part, and that’s how it all came together. I don’t look at this as an individual accomplishment because so many people were so important.”
Schalles talked about his coach, who is now not just a coach, but a close friend and mentor in the sport of wrestling and the game of life.
“Bob Bubb was and is a man of convictions ” a constant in the lives of those who had the pleasure and good fortune to call him coach,” Schalles said. “There is little question that his success had everything to do with his uncanny ability to be the rock that everyone around him stood on to take on the day-to-day challenges of academics, athletics and the ever changing social landscape.”
Schalles said Bubb would challenge the members of the team to be their own individual ” he would offer his support, guidance and opinion, but would let them make their own choices and, right or wrong, he supported their decisions.
“I’ll use this analogy,” Schalles said. “Bubb would give each of his student-athletes a coloring book representative of their lives. Every time you would visit the office to receive guidance from him he would say, ‘Wade, you can color this picture any color you want,’ referring to which direction I might choose to go on any issue. ‘Any color at all, it’s your decision, your life. I’m sure you’ll make a good choice.’ Then he’d say, ‘However, if it were me “¦ ,’ then he would proceed to tell you the way he’d make that choice and elaborate in great detail why and then say, ‘But it’s your decision Wade, you decide. I’ll back you whatever way you decide to go.’ “Schalles added, “What he did so well was give each team member the kindness and understanding to allow them to choose, in other words, the right to pick any crayon they wanted to use to color the picture.”
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