By Ray Wilde

Sports correspondent

sports@lewistownsentinel.com

BURNHAM — An overflow crowd greeted Tim Searer, President of the Mifflin County Sports Hall of Fame, on Saturday night at the fourth annual induction ceremony at the Birch Hill Country Club. Six new members were added to the Hall of Fame.

The emcee for the annual event was Roger Herto.

The six new members were George “Touch” Bohn, Annette Hoffman, John ‘Jet” Johnston, Emily Lepley Shank, Fred Stoicheff and Jon Zimmerman.

Also honored was longtime Sentinel sportswriter, Brian Carson, who received the Community Service Volunteer Award.

The guest speaker was Mitchell Mesenbrink of the Penn State national championship team.

Mesenbrink, who is from Wisconsin, explained how he arrived at Penn State. Mesenbrink was the national champ at 165 pounds. He said that his parents and the wrestling coaches through high school (his father) and the ones at Penn State have been a big influence on his life.

In two years at Penn State, the redshirt sophomore has a 53-1 record. He led the nation this past winter with 18 technical falls as he compiled a 27-0 record.

GEORGE “TOUCH” BOHN

As a student at Chief Logan HIgh School (Class of 1961), Bohn was an outstanding athlete as he lettered in four different sports, football, wrestling, track and field and baseball. He was the first Mingo to earn All-State recognition in two different sports, football and track and field. George was named to the first East vs. West Pennsylvania Big 33 game in 1961.

He left the campus of Chief Logan for Purdue University. At West Lafayette, Indiana, he was a key player on the undefeated Purdue freshmen team. After a year at Purdue, he joined the service to fight for his country in Vietnam. After his years in the service, he then went to the

University of South Dakota, where he starred in football. The 1968 team went 9-1 and lost to only North Dakota State, which won the Division II NCAA championship. He is a member of the South Dakota University Hall of Fame. George returned home (Mifflin County) and coached high school sports for 28 years. He helped get wrestling started at Rothrock High School.

ANNETTE HOFFMAN

Annette Hoffman was a star athlete at Chief Logan and Indian Valley High Schools (1989).

She was a three-star athlete in field hockey, softball and basketball. But, it was on the hard court that she became famous.

She left Indian Valley and enrolled at Juniata College (1993). Her work as a basketball player earned a spot in the Juniata College Hall of Fame. During her career in Huntingdon, she scored 2,269 points. Annette averaged 24.1 points for her career at Juniata and she still holds the record for most points in a game, 49. She also holds the record for the second most points in a game with 47. She averaged a double-double in points and rebounds her junior and senior years. She was the Middle Athletic Conference Northwest Player of the year three straight years and as a senior she was Division III Kodak Honorable Mention All-American. She also played softball for three years at Juniata.

JOHN ‘JET’ JOHNSTON

A lot of people only think of the ‘Jet’ as being a football player, but his best sport might

have been baseball. As a football player at Lewistown HIgh School (1968) he earned all-state honors as a junior and senior. He held the all-time rushing record for the Panthers with 2,083 points and was selected to the Pennsylvania Big 33 team, a rare honor for Mifflin County. He left Lewistown to attend Duke University. But, before he went off to Durnham, NC, he turned down a chance to play for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

But his baseball career was far from over. He played three years at Duke (1972) on the football team. He was good enough to be selected on the All-Atlantic Coast Conference freshmen football team. He missed his sophomore year due to illness, but came back strong for his junior and senior years. But, as a baseball player, he played and lettered all four years for the Blue Devils. Johnston played in the outfield and was in the top 10 for hitters in the ACC his senior year. Sports and football was in his blood and after graduation, he served as a graduate assistant on the Duke football team and then moved to Penn State. He was an assistant coach for the Nittany Lions for three years including the national championship year of 1982. After Penn State, he coached high school football at Harrisburg, Central Dauphin East, Reading and Lewistown. He is a member of the Pennsylvania Football Coaches Big 33 Hall of Fame. He was a coach in the 1982 Big 33 game.

EMILY LEPLEY SHANK

Lewistown High School didn’t produce a lot of state champions in track and field, but Emily Lepley (Shank) put her name into record books and Mifflin County history with her state title in 2003. As a senior, she won the state 2A title in the 100-meter hurdles, capping off an undefeated season. But, that was just the tip of the iceberg in what she did in her high school career. In District 6 competition, she won six titles, three times in the 100-meter hurdles, twice in the 300-meter hurdles and once in the 400-meter run. She was so good as a senior, she won all three events. Also as a senior, she picked up a state medal (runner-up) in the indoor season in the 60-meter hurdles. Also at the state outdoor championships (2003), she was sixth in the 300-meter hurdles. As Lewistown closed its doors with the merger, Emily held the school records for the 100 and 300 hurdles and they also are still the Mifflin County records for females.

Her next stop was Susquehanna University (2007). She had such an excellent career at Susquehanna that she was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame in 2013. While at Susquehanna, she was an eight-time All-American hurdler. She won three Mid-Atlantic Conference titles in the indoor season (55 meters) and was a three-time MAC outdoor champion in the 100- and 400-meter hurdles. When she was inducted into the college’s Hall of Fame, she held six records, three indoors and three outdoors. In 2005, Emily won the national NCAA Division III championship in the 400-meter hurdles and was named the NCAA Mid-Regional Athlete of the year.

FREDERICK A. STOICHEFF

Fred Stoicheff was the backbone of the great Lewistown High School football teams of 1957 and 1958. It was the speed of Stoicheff that helped the Panthers go 19-0 in those two years. Lewistown was 9-0 in 1957 and 10-0 in 1958. In 1957, Fred ran for 927 yards on just 64 carries. His 14.5 yards per carry stood as a Pennsylvania record for over 50 years and is still in the top 10 today. As a junior, he had 10 touchdowns and his average run from scrimmage was 49 yards. That was also a record that stood for many years. As a senior for the Panthers, he gained 851 yards on 72 carries for an 11.8 average. Fred averaged 36 yards on his touchdown runs in 1958. He scored 16 touchdowns as a senior. But, not all from his halfback position. Stoicheff picked up one on a reception and another on an interception. The AP and UPI wire services both gave Stoicheff state wide recognition. He was a member of the 1959 Pennsylvania Big 33 team, a rare feat in Mifflin County.

His college career was cut short as he had to deal with knee injuries. He attended the University of Pennsylvania and Bloomsburg State College (University). He returned home and lived in Mifflin County until his death in 2023. During his life in Mifflin County, he was

always a supporter of youth sports and for years helped with the Lewistown Babe Ruth League.

JON ZIMMERMAN

Mr. Jon Zimmerman was a man of firsts at the induction ceremonies on Saturday. Jon was the first President of the Mifflin County Sports Hall of Fame and he also was the first athlete inducted from Kishacoquillas High School (1963). At Kish, he lettered in three different sports, cross country, track and field and basketball. In basketball, he helped the Indians win the Tri-Valley League and was first team all-league and the MVP during the championship season. Jon was the school’s first great high jumper and held the school record when he graduated.

When he left Kish, he went to Dickinson College (1967), where he lettered four years in basketball and also competed in track. As a senior at Dickinson, he was named to the all-conference basketball team and was named the league’s MVP. In track, he owned the school record for the high jump when he graduated and also the record for most points scored in field events. He was inducted into the Dickinson College Sports Hall of Fame in 2001. In Mifflin County, he was an assistant coach on the Indian Valley girls basketball team that made it to the 2001 3A Final Four. Jon has been an avid golfer all his life and won a Central Counties Golf Association Junior Championship as a youth.

NOTES – There was a moment of silence for Harold Wertz, who recently passed away. Wertz was the coach of the 1963 Rothrock Class C basketball state championship team of 1963… The presenters for each inductee were George Bohn, Carvel Burtsell, daughter;

Annette Hoffman, Steve Risser, college coach; John Johnston, Tim Curley, friend; Emily Lepley Shank, Dick Yearick, high school coach; Fred Stoicheff, Junior Powell, teammate at Lewistown High School and Gail Stoicheff, a relative and Jon Zimmerman, Seth Zimmerman, son.