Rarely do Ivy League schools receive national attention for athletics, but this winter Penn is proving to be quite an anomaly.
On the heels of the basketball team's ESPN-televised game at Duke's famed Cameron Indoor Stadium, wrestling head coach Zeke Jones has been chosen to lead the United States National Freestyle team at the Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro this spring.
After the completion of the wrestling season in mid-March, Jones will head to the USA Wrestling training headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colo. to prepare his team for the Games, which are set to take place from May 31 to June 4.
Along with Kevin Jackson, the head of the U.S.'s freestyle wrestling program, Jones will be in charge of assembling the team.
Jackson was also responsible for naming the Michigan native as coach.
Jones said that individual performances at the U.S. Open Wrestling Championships and the NCAA Championships will weigh heavily on the selection process in order to accomplish his goal of "mixing the veterans with the younger guys."
Though Jones is only in his first year as Penn's coach, he is by no means new to international competition.
Jones, possibly the University's most accomplished coach in his respective sport, was a six-time U.S. Open National Freestyle champion and 1992 Olympic silver medalist before beginning his coaching career.
In 2004, he served as the freestyle head coach at the Olympics in Athens, and was on the team's coaching staff for the 1996 and 2000 games as well.
Jones was also the head coach at the last Pan American Games in Santo Domingo, where he guided the American team to first place and four individual gold medals.
Given his current responsibility as Penn's coach, it will be difficult for him to focus on the games until the season is over.
"My first priority is to the family [at Penn]," he said.
However, he noted that the grapplers are already in preparation, with many of them set for training tours in Russia and Bulgaria.
A few weeks before traveling to Brazil, the team will gather in Colorado to practice together and evaluate the other countries' teams.
Cuba is always the U.S.'s toughest competition in the Pan American Games, in which all countries in the western hemisphere can enter. Other perennial contenders include Canada and Mexico.
Despite the differences in competition, Jones said that he will bring a coaching approach to the national team similar to that of Penn's.
Though he is looking forward to taking on his familiar role at the national level, his experience could also be helpful to the Quakers in the future.
"I love working with our country's athletes," he said. "It will be nice to be able spread the knowledge I gain from working with them to our team."
While Jones was honored by his appointment, he felt that it was also a reflection on Penn and its athletic department.
"This is really a collective honor for the program," he said.
