California University of Pennsylvania Athletics

A lot of the athletes today are driven to perform by the awards and honors that they can receive for their skills. But there are also those few who aren’t. Dave Cook, a Vulcan wrestler of the late 1960’s and early 70’s, was one of the athletes who didn’t compete for awards.

“I didn’t look at it as trying to win any accolades later in life. I guess at the time I was going through something like that I didn’t really look at it that way,” he continued.

Cook, who wrestled at 142 pounds for his career, began at Chartiers-Houston in Pittsburgh. While there he was a two-time section champion, a WPIAL winner and a PIAA runner-up. Cook also played football in high school.

Cook chose to come to California for two main reasons: the school’s proximity to his home and a former coach of his in high school.

“I had some other opportunities to go out to Wisconsin or to a couple of other places in Pennsylvania, but Frank Vulcano, who was my high school coach when I was in tenth grade, was the coach of California when I got there,” Cook explained. “He was a lot more than a wrestling coach t me, he was sort of like a surrogate father, so I was very comfortable with my surroundings at California.”

Cook wrestled for a team that had matches against both Division II and Division I schools. He said that the team “had some real quality people” on it and that they were “probably one of the top four or five teams in the conference.”

While wrestling for the Vulcans, Cook compiled a 66-12-2 career record and a 48-5-2 dual meet record. He was the conference champion in 1969, a runner-up in 1970 and 1971 and a fourth-place finisher in the NCAA Eastern Regional in 1971.

“California was a great place for me. I met my wife there,” Cook said. “It was the right size school for me, and it was both far enough away from home yet close enough.”

After graduating from Cal in 1971 with an education degree, Cook began what would end up being a remarkable high school coaching career.

Cook coached Washington Junior High School to consecutive undefeated seasons in 1974 and 1975. From there, he traveled to Ringgold where he began a wrestling program and then coached if for three years. Cook went back to his high school alma mater to coach its wrestling team, which won a section title in 1980. In 1981, he moved on again and took the head coaching job at wrestling powerhouse Canon-McMillan, a position which he held from 1981-86.

That program went 96-16-1 under Cook’s direction. Canon-McMillan’s wrestling team won two WPIAL titles, placed second in the WPIAL twice and were runners-up in the state three times during Cook’s tenure.

“We had just started to dominate quite a bit when I was there,” Cook said about his Canon-McMillan squad. “At that point in time, they were on their way and had a lot of talent that had carried on for the past four or five years.”

In 1986, Cook left the teaching and coaching professions to work for State Farm Insurance, where he is now an agency field executive.

“When I left (teaching and coaching), I think it was the right time to get out. I think sometimes people stay around sports too long and become not as enthusiastic as they should be. And at the high school level you have to be enthusiastic,” Cook explained.

Cook’s enthusiasm for sports still runs deep even though he doesn’t get to see a lot of wrestling now. He said that he watches more girls’ basketball because that is what his daughters play. And getting inducted into the hall of fame for his contributions to the university are as he said “an honor.”

“I think it is good that California remembers to honor the people that have gone through there. Being that it is only the second year of it, it is quite an honor to get in there,” Cook said.

“Hopefully over the years it will just grow bigger and bigger. It is good to get in on the ground floor.”

Even though Cook’s induction comes at the same time that the wrestling program at Cal is being phased out, he said that he understands why it is happening.

“In this financial and economical world that we live in now, most of the things that are done are done because there is a need for it. Of course, with Title IX, where you have to have as many female sports as you do men sports, it gets tough for colleges to offset the costs of a wrestling program. That becomes one of the sports that they get rid of right away,” Cook explained.

However, he does feel that the decision to cancel the wrestling program will hurt the university in the long run.

“I really think that being California is in Western Pennsylvania and Western Pennsylvania is a hotbed for wrestling, it’s going to hurt the school. There were a lot of great people that came to California for the wrestling program, and that was their catapult into the future,” Cook said. “I think that it is going to be lost now. Wrestling is an outstanding sport, and California is an outstanding institution, and I think these go hand in hand.”

He went on to say, “It was a good four years there, and it helped me grow up. It certainly helped me after I left there because of the good education.”

Dave Cook was an outstanding 145-pound Vulcan wrestler in the late 1960's and early 1970's. Cook compiled a 66-12-2 career collegiate record and a 48-5-2 dual meet record. In 1969, Cook won the 145-pound PSAC championship and was PSAC finalist in 1970 and 1971. Cook, who was also the PSAC's 142-pound freshman champion in 1968, was a three-time NAIA national qualifier and a 1971 NCAA Division I national qualifier after placing fourth at the East Regional.

Cook is also an accomplished wrestling official and coach. After starting the Ringgold wrestling program in the mid-1970's, Cook coached Charters-Houston for two seasons, compiling a 39-5 cumulative record. Cook then coached at Canon-McMillan from 1981-86, compiling a brilliant 96-16-1 cumulative record with two WPIAL team titles, two WPIAL runner-up finishes and a PIAA state runner-up showing.

Cook is presently an agency field executive with the State Farm Insurance Company and resides in Downingtown, Pa. Cook and his wife, Patricia, have three children- Kristin, Karrie, and Kelly. He is originally from Houston, Pa., and a graduate of Chartiers-Houston High School.