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2021 Special Awards Announcements
March-April-early May
Written feature stories on each Special Awards recipient posted on CoSIDA.com, social channels.
May is CoSIDA Awards Month
A video series highlighting 2020 and 2021 Special Awards honorees will be showcased on CoSIDA.com.
Plans are underway to honor the 2020 and 2021 CoSIDA Hall of Fame classes and the CoSIDA Academic All-America® Hall of Fame classes of 2020 and 2021, with pre-recorded video presentations during the June virtual convention.
The College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) organization continues its week-long announcement of its 2021 Special Awards Tuesday by recognizing four more outstanding members for top university division and college division honors. These honors are presented for distinguished contributions to the profession.
The 2021 recipients of the CoSIDA Warren Berg, Arch Ward and Rising Star honors are below. On February 22, the six-member 2021 CoSIDA Hall of Fame Class
was announced.
Pete Moore, the Director of Athletic Communications at Syracuse University and the a member of the CoSIDA Past Presidents’ Advisory Council, will be recognized with the 2021 Arch Ward Award, while
Dave Reed, Associate Director of Athletic Communications at Colorado College, will receive the Warren Berg Award.
Both honors are presented annually to a CoSIDA member who has made outstanding contributions to the field of athletic communications, and who by his or her activities, has brought dignity and prestige to the profession. The Berg Award is exclusively a college division honor.
Katie Mucci, the Assistant Commissioner for Technology and New Media at the Missouri Valley Conference and
Anthony (A.J.) O’Hagan, the Sports Information Director at Yeshiva University, and are the winners of CoSIDA’s Rising Star Awards in the university and college divisions, respectively.
The Rising Star Award honors a CoSIDA member with 10 years of service or less whose work, service, dedication, energy and enthusiasm to the profession make that individual a "rising star" in athletic communications.
A closer look at the individuals honored today:
ARCH WARD AWARD
Pete Moore – Syracuse (Director of Athletic Communications)
Serving as Syracuse’s Director of Athletic Communications since August 2007,
Pete Moore is the primary media contact for Syracuse men’s basketball and women’s soccer and assists with football.
Moore began his Syracuse tenure in 1998 as assistant director, was promoted to associate director in 2001, and to his current role six years later.
Moore is one of the longest-serving CoSIDA members in Board of Directors history. A 12-year member of the Board of Directors, Moore served three years as a college division representative, four years in the officer's rotation and then a remarkable five years as a Past President. As other former officers, left the profession, Moore returned to serve two additional years as a Past President on the Board in 2004-05 and 2005-06.
His recent CoSIDA volunteer work helped result in updated governance changes for the organization.
Within the last year-plus, Moore played an integral role in CoSIDA's Board restructuring, serving on the Governance Working Group and helped coordinate the organization of the Past President's Divisional Cabinet. He serves as that Cabinet's chair on the new CoSIDA Advisory Council.
Moore was inducted into the CoSIDA Hall of Fame in 1998 and earned the Warren Berg Award one year later. He is a past president of the Eastern College Athletic Conference Sports Information Directors Association (ECAC-SIDA, now EASTCOMM), serving on its board for six years. He received ECAC-SIDA’s Irving T. Marsh Award in 2001. CoSIDA presented him with its 25-Year Award in 2008.
Moore graduated from Ashland College in 1981. Prior SID service included time at Ashland, Kansas Newman College and Ithaca College. He was 1995 Ithaca Hall of Fame inductee.
Arch Ward Award
Presented annually to
a current CoSIDA member who has made outstanding contributions to the field of college sports information, and who by his or her activities, has brought dignity and prestige to the profession.
Voted on by the Special Awards Committee.
WARREN BERG AWARD
Dave Reed – Colorado College (Associate Director of Athletic Communications)
Dave Reed is in his 22nd year of service at Colorado College. He has served there since 1999, often as the sole person overseeing the Tigers’ 14 NCAA Division III Programs. The head communications director oversees the department’s Division I ice hockey and women’s soccer teams.
Since the inaugural Warren Berg Award in 1985, Reed becomes the first assistant or associate SID (a non-department head) to earn this prestigious honor.
Reed received the CoSIDA College Division Achievement Award in 2017, given to an associate or assistant SID for outstanding service and dedication. He also was the 2010 American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) Grant Burger Media Award recipient.
He has a varied background, starting as a sport program associate with The Ohio State University (1992-93) and was assistant SID at the University of Notre Dame (1993-1996). Reed then stepped away from college athletic communications, serving as a USAToday.com content developer and stringer manager and then was Director of Communications for the American Volleyball Coaches Association before coming to Colorado College.
Reed has long-time service to CoSIDA and affiliated organizations. A college division representative on the CoSIDA Board of Directors from 2007-2010, he also served two terms with the (former) College Division Management Advisory Committee in 2008-2010 and 2017-18.
He currently serves on the CoSIDA Special Awards Committee. Among his numerous committee service, Reed was a member of CoSIDA’s former Membership Services Committee (2012-14) and Convention Programming Committee (2014-17) and was on the NCAA Statistics and Records Advisory Board from 2009-12.
A leader on his Colorado College campus, he has served as the co-chair for Colorado College’s Staff Council and graduated from the Colorado College Leadership Academy in 2013.
Warren Berg Award
Presented annually to a CoSIDA
college division (NCAA DII, DIII, NAIA, Two-year Colleges, and Canadian/U Sports)
member who has made outstanding contributions to the field of college sports information, and who by his or her activities, has brought dignity and prestige to the profession.
Voted on by the Special Awards Committee. (Note: Nominees can be an active or retired member.)
RISING STAR AWARD, UNIVERSITY DIVISION
Katie Mucci – Missouri Valley Conference (Assistant Commissioner for New Media and Technology)
Katie Mucci’s work in the digital/new media areas has earned rave reviews from her colleagues since she started her athletic communications career. At the MVC since the summer of 2018, Mucci handles all aspects of the league’s creative and digital content, oversees Conference social media strategies, manages internal design projects, Conference marketing and promotional projects, and oversees all league video content for both the website and MVC-produced television broadcasts.
She chaired CoSIDA’s New Media Committee from 2016-2020 and introduced and coordinated that committee’s numerous professional development and education videos, graphics and content stories for the CoSIDA membership. With other young CoSIDA members, she also coordinated and hosted a series of podcasts on numerous topics and issues facing athletic communicators.
Currently, Mucci is a member of CoSIDA’s Young Professionals Committee and part of the WoSIDA (Women of CoSIDA) steering committee. She served on panels at CoSIDA conventions in 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018.
In the CoSIDA Publications and Digital Design contests, she has earned two “Best In the Nation” citations for media guide covers. She was named a “Rising 25 Award Winner” by Front Office Sports/Teamwork Online.
Mucci is a 2014 graduate of Northern Colorado, where she served as a sports information intern her senior year in 2013-14. Dhe moved to the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference in 2014-15 as Assistant Director of New Media and Technology, where under her leadership, the SCAC became a model for Division III conferences in the areas of social and digital media. She served at the SCAC until starting with the MVC in July of 2018.
Rising Star Award
Presented annually to two CoSIDA members – one in the University Division (NCAA DI) and one in the College Division (NCAA DII, DIII, NAIA, Two-year Colleges, U Sports) – with 10 years of service or less whose work at their institution, conference office or intercollegiate athletics-affiliated association and service, dedication, energy and enthusiasm to the profession make that
individual a "rising star" in sports information. Voted on by the Special Awards Committee.
RISING STAR AWARD, COLLEGE DIVISION
Anthony (A.J.) O'Hagan – Yeshiva (Sports Information Director)
In six short years,
A.J. O’Hagan has flourished in his role at Yeshiva University, a Division III program located in New York City. He oversees work for 15 varsity teams, including maintenance of the Maccabees’ website and social media channels, and has coordinated national and regional coverage for his sports teams.
He has produced media coverage for Yeshiva from a wide variety of NYC outlets, including NBC New York, PIX 11 News, the New York Post, and ABC 7 Eyewitness News and Yeshiva’s teams have gotten mention in
Sports Illustrated. He championed the Yeshiva teams who made their initial appearance in the NCAA Division III playoffs, including women’s and men’s tennis as well as men’s basketball. In 2016, O’Hagan was the Media Relations Coordinator for the NCAA Fencing Northeast Regional.
O’Hagan is an active member of CoSIDA’s Goodwill and Wellness Committee.
What makes O’Hagan’s achievements in athletic communications that more impressive is that he lives with autism. At three years old, he was diagnosed with the neurological condition marked by differences in learning styles, passionate interests in specific subjects, repetitive motion and sometimes difficulty with language and communication.
O’Hagan is a passionate advocate and volunteer for those with disabilities and for autism awareness. While an undergraduate at Utica College, he formed an Autism Awareness Club in January 2009 and did lectures, fundraising events, movie nights and more to raise awareness. Now, O’Hagan continues with independent lectures, serves as a panelist at conferences, and every April during Autism Awareness Month, he promotes awareness on his social media channels.
Previous to his time at Yeshiva, he worked at Manhattanville College and then at Lehman College where he was Assistant SID for two years.
A 2011 graduate of Utica College with a degree in journalism, O'Hagan was the sports editor for the college newspaper and video coordinator for the Pioneerss’ men’s ice hockey team. He was named the National Collegiate Journalist of the Year by the National Society for Collegiate Journalists. In September of 2016, he earned an Alumni Award for "Young Leadership" from Utica.
Rising Star Award
Presented annually to two CoSIDA members – one in the University Division (NCAA DI) and one in the College Division (NCAA DII, DIII, NAIA, Two-year Colleges, U Sports) – with 10 years of service or less whose work at their institution, conference office or intercollegiate athletics-affiliated association and service, dedication, energy and enthusiasm to the profession make that
individual a "rising star" in sports information. Voted on by the Special Awards Committee.
Honoree information complied by CoSIDA Special Awards Committee member Dennis O'Donnell (University of Rochester) and Barb Kowal, CoSIDA Director of Professional Development and External Affairs.