Naval Academy Athletics

Mike Evans, a former three-time All-American at the University of Iowa, is in his fourth season as an assistant coach after spending the previous three seasons on the Campbell wrestling staff, including the 2019-20 season as head assistant coach.
   
Evans works primarily with the wrestlers at 157, 165 and 174 pounds.
 
Evans helped shape Sammy Starr (174) into a consistent starter in 2022-23. Starr recorded 21 victories and won five dual matches during his sophomore campaign. He was one of only two Mids to wrestle in every dual during the season. Starr provided a huge win in Navy’s, 19-18, comeback victory against Binghamton. The Mids were behind, 15-6, but Starr defeated Sam DePrez by fall (4:06) to help Navy begin its comeback. Starr had an impressive performance in his first appearance at the EIWA Championship. He won four of his six matches to finish in fifth place.
 
Although Andrew Cerniglia (157) dealt with injuries throughout the season, he wrestled in one of the biggest matches of the season for Navy. The Mids held a 15-13 lead against Army in the Star Match and Cernigila stepped onto the mat to battle Nathan Lukez in the final bout of the dual. He trailed, 1-0, entering the third period, but scored seven points in the final two minutes to win by a 7-2 decision. It marked the second time Cerniglia clinched the Star Match in his career. He also won the Bearcat Open for the second-straight season with a 4-0 record at the tournament.
 
Evans also helped guide Val Park (165) to his second-straight 20-win season. Park placed in three tournaments during his senior season, finishing in second place at the Clarion Open and fifth place at the Bearcat Open and Navy Classic.
 
In the 2021-22 season, Evans worked alongside one of Navy’s three NCAA qualifiers, Andrew Cerniglia (157). He finished the season with a team-leading 27 wins and was tied with Josh Koderhandt as the team leader in dual wins with nine.
   
Cerniglia claimed individual titles at the Clarion Open and Bearcat Open. Additionally, he defeated six nationally-ranked opponents during the season, including sixth-ranked Josh Humphreys of Lehigh at the EIWA Championship. Cerniglia defeated top-seeded Humphreys with a fall in 2:52 and went on to place second at the EIWA Championship.
   
Evans also worked with Val Park, who comprised a 22-win season and placed eighth at the EIWA Championship at 165 pounds. Freshman Cael Crebs developed quickly into Navy’s 174-pound starter, finishing the season with 14 wins and four dual victories.
   
Evans and the Navy staff arrived in Annapolis at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, maneuvering their way through what would be a shortened season that featured only dual competition outside of the postseason conference and national tournaments.
   
After dropping its season-opener to Pitt 22-14, Navy won its final five duals of 2020-21, including a 41-3 victory at Clarion on Jan. 9 to give Cary Kolat and his staff their first win at the Academy. The Midshipmen also claimed a 21-9 victory over Lehigh, their first against the reigning EIWA champions since defeating the Mountain Hawks 19-15 in Annapolis on Jan. 15, 2011. From there, Navy put together back-to-back shutouts against Cleveland State (37-0) and George Mason (44-0), marking the first time the Midshipmen put together two-straight shutout victories since the 1962-63 season when they blanked Hofstra 24-0 and followed up with a 30-0 win over Virginia Tech. Navy closed out the dual season by scoring a 20-13 victory over Army in the annual Star Match which was held at Christl Arena in West Point.
   
Navy placed second at the EIWA Championship, the program’s best finish since 2013 (2nd). Seven Mids wrestled in the semifinals, while five competed in the finals, as seven of the Mids’ nine wrestlers placed among the top three.   
    
Nine wrestlers represented Navy at the NCAA Championship, marking just the third time in program history that Navy has sent nine or more wrestlers to the national tournament and the first since 1969. Logan Treaster (125), Jacob Allen (133), Cody Trybus (141), Andrew Cerniglia (157), Tanner Skidgel (165), David Key (184) and Jacob Koser (197) earned automatic berths by way of their finish at the EIWA Championship, while Casey Cobb (149) and John Birchmeier (285) earned at-large bids. Five of the nine wrestlers won at least one match, as the Mids went on to finish 37th out of 63 teams.
   
Serving alongside Cary Kolat, he helped lead the Campbell wrestling program to unprecedented success in recent years. The Camels wrapped up the 2019-20 season by posting an 11-2 record that featured wins in each of their last nine duals. Among that nine-match winning streak, CU put together an undefeated mark (7-0) in Southern Conference action. Campbell secured its second straight and third overall SoCon Tournament Championship in four years thanks to crowning five individual champions.
   
A program-record six wrestlers qualified for the NCAA Championship for a second consecutive year. Among those qualifiers were three wrestlers seeded among the top 10, including 133-pound Noah Gonser, a three-time NCAA qualifier who was named the 2020 SoCon Wrestler of the Year. Josh Heil (141), meanwhile, is also a three-time NCAA qualifier and the school’s first three-time SoCon Champion. At 184 pounds Andrew Morgan was ranked as high as No. 6 in the nation, winning the 2020 SoCon title and qualifying for his second NCAA Championship.
   
Campbell, who ranked as high as No. 12 in the country (InterMat), completed a sweep of its regular-season conference schedule with a 35-13 win at Davidson on February 23, claiming its second straight league dual championship. The dual title is the first outright regular-season championship for the Camels in program history, while its undefeated conference record also was also a first.
   
In 2018-19, Evans was promoted to assistant coach after serving as a volunteer coach during the 2017-18 campaign. He helped the Camels capture their second SoCon Tournament title in three years, while also earning the school’s first regular-season conference championship. CU earned a share of the SoCon dual title with a 5-1 league mark to go along with a 7-1 overall dual record. It earned the program’s first top-25 national ranking, while placing a program-best 10th at the prestigious Midlands Championship.
   
Campbell sent a school-record six to the NCAA Championships in 2019, while eight total Camels earned spots on the podium at the SoCon Championships, with all 10 wrestling for medals.
   
Additionally, Campbell earned National Wrestling Coaches Association Division I Academic Team honors for the third-straight year. The Camels finished 13th nationally in the standings with a 3.28 team grade-point average, posting a top-25 academic finish for the fifth time in program history.
   
In his first season in Buies Creek (2017-18), the Camels boasted a top-three finish in the SoCon and ranked in the top-25 of the NWCA Division I All-Academic team standings. After winning the SoCon Championship in 2017, CU placed third in 2018, and took ninth in the NWCA All-Academic team ranks.
   
Four Camels made the individual NWCA All-Academic team, including Jere Heino, Austin Kraisser, Andrew Morgan and Quentin Perez, while five medaled at the 2018 SoCon Championships, highlighted by Jere Heino’s title at heavyweight.
   
Evans came to Campbell after a stint as an assistant coach at Cal Poly under former head coach Brendan Buckley and Scotti Sentes, who was elevated to head coach at Campbell following Kolat’s departure.
   
The Enola, Pa., native earned three All-America citations as a member of the Iowa wrestling team and posted a 107-27 record in his four years of competition at the 174-pound weight class. He finished his career with a trio of runner-up finishes and one third-place finish at the Big 10 Conference Championships. Additionally, he placed sixth in each of his three appearances at the NCAA Wrestling Championships.
   
Evans compiled a 165-8 overall mark at Blair Academy (N.J.) as a prep, including a flawless 52-0 record in his senior year. He captured the prep state and national titles at the 189-pound weight class during his final year. Evans also won the Pennsylvania freestyle and Greco-Roman state championship three times.