College Sports Information Directors of America

The College Sports Information Directors of America will honor some of its outstanding members as well as members of the sports media community at its annual convention, July 3-6, in Philadelphia, Pa.

CoSIDA has honored its finest every year since 1958 when the organization gave out its Arch Ward and Jake Wade Awards.  This year, CoSIDA will award 18 individuals with nine of its awards.

Since 1969, CoSIDA has inducted 142 members into its Hall of Fame.  This year, Bo Carter of the Big 12 Conference, Bill Hancock of the NCAA and Gary Anderson of the University of Nebraska at Omaha join the ranks of CoSIDA’s elite.

Boston University’s Ed Carpenter is this year’s recipient of the Arch Ward Award, which is presented to a CoSIDA member who has made an outstanding contribution in the field of college sports information.

Bill Hamilton of South Carolina State University will be honored with the Trailblazer Award, which goes to an individual who is a pioneer in the field of sports information who has mentored and helped improve the level of ethnic and gender diversity within CoSIDA.

Wayne Block of Christopher Newport University has been named the winner of this year’s Warren Berg Award, which is presented to a CoSIDA College Division member who has made outstanding contributions to the field of sports information.

Howard University’s Edward Hill, Jr., is this year’s honoree for the Bob Kenworthy Community Service Award.

CoSIDA honors members outside of its profession every year and this year’s recipients have made significant contributions to intercollegiate athletics and college sports information.

 

Mel Greenberg of the Philadelphia Inquirer is this year’s winner of the Jake Wade Award, which goes to an individual who has made outstanding contributions in the media to intercollegiate athletics. 

Jim Albright, who from 1970-93 was Coordinator of U.S. Sports Programs for Eastman Kodak Company, and was a significant contributor to the CoSIDA Convention each year and to college sports information, will receive the Keith Jackson Eternal Flame Award.

Also, seven individuals will be receiving their 25-Year Awards at this year’s convention commemorating each member’s lengthy service in college sports information and CoSIDA – Boise State University’s Max Corbet, Bill Cousins of Rice University, Lawrence Fan of San Jose State, Brad Larsen of Weber State University, University of North Carolina’s Dave Lohse, Dan O’Connell of Towson University and University of Louisville’s Nancy Allison Worley.

Shippensburg University’s John Alosi will also be honored with Lifetime Achievement Awards, given to members who have served at least 25 years in the profession and who are retiring or leaving the profession this year.

Here’s a little more about each of this year’s awards recipients:

            Carter has been at the Big 12 Conference as Sports Information Director since its inception in 1996 after serving as Assistant Commissioner in the Southwest Conference office from 1986-96.  He also worked in the Mississippi State University Sports Information Office from 1974-86, including being the Bulldog SID from 1978-86.

            A 1974 graduate of Vanderbilt, Carter has is a former President and current Executive Director of the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association and has worked 21 College World Series, six NCAA men’s and women’s Final Fours and 18 Cotton Bowls.

            Hancock began his career in sports information as Assistant SID at Oklahoma from 1971-74.  Since then, he has served as Media Relations Director and Assistant Commissioner for the Big Eight Conference (1978-88) and was the Tournament Director of the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championships from 1989-2002 before serving as its current media director.

            A 1972 graduate of Oklahoma, Hancock receive the Katha Quinn Award in 1999, presented annually by the United States Basketball Writers Association to an individual who has provided exemplary service to the media.  He was honored in 1995 by the University of Oklahoma with its “Outstanding Journalism Graduate” award.  He has also been selected as a media attaché for U.S. Olympic Teams in six Olympic Games.

          Anderson has been the Sports Information Director at Nebraska-Omaha since 1979.  Prior to his tenure at UNO, he had been in corporate public relations for eight years and had been a sports writer for the Omaha World-Herald.

            A CoSIDA member for 26 years, he has also been president of the Omaha Sportscasters Association and the Elkhorn Baseball Association, and served as the interim director of athletics at UNO on three occasions.

             Anderson helped with the start of Division I men’s ice hockey to UNO and organized the first season ticket drive for the sport, selling 6,400 season tickets in the first 16 days for the Mavericks.  He has also written a book, “Those Were the Knights:  The History of Professional Hockey in Omaha.”

            Carpenter has overseen the SID office at Boston University since 1977, having been the Assistant Athletic Director for Communications the last two years.  He also spent six years at the University of Delaware and also working for the New Haven Register and the Clearfield Progress. 

            A 1965 graduate of Penn State, Carpenter also was in the U.S. Air Force from 1965-69 and earned a USAF Commendation Medal for his service.

            Currently an ex-officio member of the CoSIDA Board as its Marketing Director, Carpenter has also served as the organization’s president from 1992-93 and has been active on various committees.  He was inducted into the CoSIDA Hall of Fame in 1996 and was recognized with the 25-Year Award as well in 1996.

            Hamilton is in his 32^nd year as sports information director at South Carolina State University, where he was named Staff Employee of the Year in 1999, and inducted into the Athletic Hall of Fame in 2000.

            A 1973 graduate of South Carolina State, Hamilton has served on the NCAA Men’s Final Four Media Coordination Committee since 1999.  In 1995, he earned a CoSIDA Excellence in Writing Citation and in 1989, was given the BCSIDA Cal Jacox-Champ Clark Award as the top SID in historical black colleges.

            He is currently president of the BCSIDA and has served on various CoSIDA committees.  He was a member of the CoSIDA Board of Directors from 1993-96 and has attended every CoSIDA workshop since 1974.  In 1998, he was given the Kodak Good Person Award and the 25-Year Service Award.

            Block has been in sports information since 1968, when he was the SID at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.  He moved to C.W. Post as the SID from 1970-71 and then became an Assistant SID at Virginia Tech from 1971-75.  He was the Director of the News Bureau at Hampton University from 1975-77.

            Before reaching Christopher Newport in 1983 as SID, Block held various positions in the Tidewater, Va. Area, including News Director at several radio stations, and the publisher of a weekly magazine.

            A 1966 Hofstra graduate, Block earned the 1997 Virginia Sports Information Directors Distinguished Service Award and was inducted into the CNU Hall of Fame in 2000.  He has been on the CoSIDA Committee on Committees for nine years, including the last four as its chairman.

            Hill has been the Sports Information Director at Howard University for the past 21 years. 

Before coming to Howard, Hill was a staff writer for the Winston-Salem Chronicle and the Black Sports Review. He also worked as a news aid and freelance writer for the Washington Post.

He is also active in the Washington, D.C. community where he serves as head coach and co-founder of the DC Warriors basketball program and as a counselor of the National Youth Sports Program for more than 20 years.

The University of District of Columbia graduate, also teaches a sports media class at Howard University.

           Greenberg, a pioneer in the coverage of women's college basketball, has been at the Philadelphia Inquirer since 1969.

From 1976-94, Greenberg was the coordinator of the national women’s Associated Press Basketball Poll, which he created until the AP switched to a writer’s panel and administered it internally.

In 1991, he was the recipient of the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) Media Award, which now bears his name.  In 1992, he was inducted into the Philadelphia Big Five Hall of Fame, and, in 2002, earned passage into the U.S. Basketball Writers Association Hall of Fame.

In 2003, he was recognized by the BIG EAST Conference for his coverage of the league.

           Albright represented Eastman Kodak Company in all of its long-standing sponsorship activities with CoSIDA from 1979-98.

            He helped create the Kodak Good Person Award in 1993 and personally presented it from 1993-98 at the CoSIDA Workshop.  The award is now named after Bob Kenworthy, legendery former SID at Gettysburg College.

            Even after his 1993 retirement from Kodak, Albright remained involved with intercollegiate athletics working with Kodak’s collegiate sports programs. 

            He has also received citations from the American Football Coaches Association, U.S. Basketball Writers Association, Women’s Basketball Coaches Association, ECAC-SIDA and BCSIDA.

This year’s group receiving 25-Year Awards includes Boise State’s Max Corbet, who was CoSIDA President in 2000-01.  He was on the CoSIDA Board for nine years and has attended all but one workshop since 1979.  He has also been the Sports Information Director at East Texas State (1979-81) and Stephen F. Austin (1981-86).

Bill Cousins has been at Rice since 1983, starting as assistant SID and becoming Assistant AD for Media Relations in 1984.  He was SID at West Texas State from 1974-77.  In 1991, the Rice press box receiving an outstanding services award by the Football Writers Association of America.

Lawrence Fan has been at San Jose State since 1980 as its SID.  He has also served at LaSalle College, Western Illinois and Frostburg State.  Since 1994, he has been chair of the CoSIDA Job Seekers Committee, where he has kept the membership abreast of job openings around the nation.

Brad Larsen was named the SID at Weber State in 1979 and was promoted to Assistant AD for Media Relations in 2004.  Larsen was also the SID at Northern Iowa and worked as a student assistant in the SID office at Utah State, where he graduated in 1978.  He was an Assistant Venue Press Chief for Gymnastics and Tennis at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

Dave Lohse has been active in the North Carolina sports information office since being a student assistant from 1977-79.  He then became assistant SID in 1979 and was named associate SID in 1990, the position he currently serves.  He has received 70 citations for publications from CoSIDA and has worked several Olympic Games.

Dan O’Connell has been the Associate Director of Media Relations at Towson University since 1979.  He has also been the SID at Maryland-Baltimore County and the Assistant SID at Loyola College.  Since 1987, he has been a member of the CoSIDA Academic All-America Committee and has served as a district and national coordinator.

Nancy Allison Worley began her career in college sports information as the SID at Valparaiso in 1980 and moved to Illinois State as assistant SID in 1982.  She joined the staff at Louisville as associate SID in 1983, where she has since been.  She worked the 1996 Centennial Olympic Games in Atlanta, covering beach volleyball, indoor volleyball and road cycling.