Craft, Springs, Tupa highlight HOF class to be inducted this fall
Men’s basketball player Aaron Craft, football players Shawn Springs and Tom Tupa and wrestler Logan Stieber headline a 15-member class to be inducted into the Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame this fall.
The class, which will be officially inducted during a Sept. 9 dinner at the Covelli Center and recognized the next day at halftime of a football game against Arkansas State, features 15 athletes from 10 different sports as well as one coach: John Bluem, who led the men’s soccer program from 1997-2017.
Thirteen of the 15 inductees are men. Jenna Harris Griffin, a four-year all-Big Ten member of the women’s track and field team from 2004-08, and Alayna Markwordt, the all-time leader in goals and points for the women’s lacrosse team, are the lone female inductees in the class.
One inductee, Charles W. Bolen, played both football and basketball for the Buckeyes. Bolen was on the football team from 1915-17 and the basketball team from 1916-18.
Including Bolen, four football players are in the class. Billy Ray Anders, who had never played football until trying out for the Buckeyes in 1965, started all three seasons from 1965-67 and was a first-team all-Big Ten player in his final season. A three-year starter from 1994-96, Springs was named Big Ten defensive player of the year in 1996 and is the highest-drafted cornerback in Ohio State history after being taken No. 3 overall by Seattle.
Tupa, a two-way player, lettered from 1984-87 as a punter and quarterback and was the starter when the Buckeyes won at Michigan in coach Earle Bruce’s final game.
Stieber was the fourth wrestler in NCAA history and first in the Big Ten to win four individual national championships, and as a senior in 2015 he helped lead the Buckeyes to their first national championship in program history. He’s one of two wrestlers in the class and is joined by Dan Whitacre, a heavyweight from 1925-27 who won Big Ten titles in his final two seasons. Stieber is currently an assistant coach for the program.
Baseball also has two inductees: Jonathan Sweet (1992-94), a three-year letter-winner who
was Big Ten player of the year in his final season, and Russ Nagelson (1964-66), who helped Ohio State win its only College World Series title in 1966.
Craft is Ohio State’s alltime leader in steals and assists after playing for the Buckeyes from 2011-14 and is now attending medical school at the university. His 119 career wins are tied for the most for an individual in program history and is one of three Big Ten players with at least 600 career assists and 300 steals.
Rounding out the class are Greg Bice (men’s lacrosse, 2001-04), Joel Brown (men’s track, 2001-04) and Adam Crompton (men’s fencing 2003-06).