The College of New Jersey Athletics

Legendary wrestling coach David Icenhower spent 35 seasons at the helm of one of the division’s most successful program. Icenhower produced five NCAA Division III team championship winners at TCNJ, beginning with the 1979 team, which achieved the first NCAA crown in the College’s history. “Ice” also piloted the Lions to national titles in 1981, 1983, 1984, and 1987. During the 2003-04 season, the Lions set a school record for wins as the team racked up 21 victories. His 535 career coaching victories ranks fourth most in NCAA history.
 
Icenhower coached one of the country’s most successful Division III wrestling programs. The Lions are one of just two NCAA Division III teams to participate in the national tournament all 45 years it has been contested. 

A 1971 graduate of Lehigh University and a product of the Division I school’s outstanding wrestling program, Icenhower was twice a member of the NCAA Wrestling Sports Committee and has chaired its Division III subcommittee. He also served two terms on the National Wrestling Coaches Association Board of Directors. In 1986, he served as tournament director for the NCAA Division III Championships, which was hosted by TCNJ.
 
Icenhower’s teams won 10 New Jersey Athletic Conference championships outright and tied for another, posting a 56-5 league mark during that 14-year period (1980–93). In 1988, TCNJ also won the first annual NJAC postseason tournament, which was also hosted by the College. 

Named the Division III Coach-of-the-Year in 1979 and 1987, Icenhower produced wrestlers who combined for 132 All-American honors, including 20 Division III individual champions and one Division I titlist. Under Icenhower, the Lions won 26 Metropolitan Conference championships, including 14 in a row from 1984 until 1998. He was cited as the Met’s Coach-of-the-Year 14 times. 

Perhaps his crowning achievement, however, came in 1982 when he became the only Division III pilot to ever be a head coach in the prestigious East-West All-Star Meet. The honor repeated itself in 1997 when Icenhower was once again tapped to serve as a coach for the All-Star Meet, becoming the first Division III coach to serve twice on the staff of the East-West All-Star Meet. At the 1999 NCAA Championships, Icenhower was inducted into the NWCA Division III Hall of Fame and joined an elite club of just four coaches in all divisions that have coached over 100 NCAA All-Americans.