TEMPE – Former Sun Devil Wrestling head coach Lee Roy Smith was inducted into the Oklahoma Sports Hall of Fame on Aug. 15, 2022 alongside five others. In his nine-year stint as ASU’s head coach, the Sun Devils had three individual NCAA champions, 28 All-Americans, 27 individual Pac-10 champions, five NCAA top-10 finishes and five Pac-10 team titles. Smith was a four-time Pac-10 Coach of the Year. Smith later became executive director of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame and Museum in 2004.
USA Wrestling/Wrestling HOF Initial announcement and extended Lee Roy Smith bio
Oklahoma Sports Hall of Fame
Class of 2022 Inductees:
Chuck Bowman
Lane Frost*
RW McQuarters
Wilcy Moore*
Tinker Owens
Lee Roy Smith
*Inducted Posthumously
The Del City, Oklahoma, native was the first two-time Oklahoma state champion for Del City high school, going 71-3 and earned the Outstanding Wrestler award his senior year. He was also the first wrestler from Oklahoma to win two National Junior Freestyle Championships. Smith went on to wrestle at Oklahoma State University where he was a four-time Big Eight champion and three-time All-American – he lifted the NCAA 142 lb title in 1980. Smith was the first wrestler in OSU’s storied history to reach 100 wins and was the Cowboys’ 1980 Athlete of the Year.
After college, Smith was a wrestling graduate assistant at OSU in between international competitions. He’s a three-time National Open Freestyle champion and twice earned Outstanding Wrestler. He won the 1984 Olympic Trials and qualified for two World championship teams, earning a silver medal in 1983, while also capturing silver medals at the World Cup in 1983 and 1984.
His coaching resume includes a two-year stop with the Swiss Wrestling Federation), a four-year position with USA Wrestling as their national freestyle coach, and his nine-year stint with ASU. Smith was on the 1996 Olympic broadcast team, and in 2000 returned to the Olympics as a management and production team liaison.