Everett Collier was and is more than an outstanding football player. In fact, it was his difficulty in adjusting to small-town life that led him to participate in Bluffton music and drama activities, which now occupy a lot of his personal time.
A graduate of Shaker Heights High School near Cleveland, where he lettered in football and basketball and was an all-league standout, Collier was urged to attend Bluffton by another Shaker Heights student, Henry Freeman. He became a four-year football letter winner at Bluffton, earning Hoosier-Buckeye Collegiate Conference and NAIA District 22 honors twice. He also was an honorable mention All-American, played in
the All-Ohio Shrine Bowl, was most valuable offensive player and team captain in 1974 and was a member of the 1972 HBCC championship team.
Collier was an assistant football coach at Bluffton from 1985-89 and assistant basketball coach at Bluffton High School from 1986-89. He has also assisted with the Bluffton High School girls’ basketball and volleyball teams, and has served as postmaster of the village of Bluffton.
e spring. She received the Kathryn Little Award as the outstanding senior woman athlete in 1980.
Coach Kim Fischer’s team also holds school marks for points per game (77), winning margin (11.5), field goal percentage (.445) and single-season winning streak (six).
Zickafoose, a graduate of South Adams High School in Berne, Ind., earned two letters in basketball, three in tennis and four in volleyball at Bluffton. She captained the volleyball team her final two years.
also coached volleyball for several years at the junior high and assistant varsity levels. Two of her Bluffton tennis players qualified for and played in the national tournament in 1984.
) Bareiter was a four-year letter winner in volleyball, basketball and softball, and earned the Kathryn Little Award as the outstanding senior female athlete in 1983.
Gilbert was a powerful attacker for Coach Kim Fischer’s volleyball teams from 1979-82, but was exceptional at all positions on the court. In her senior season, she was named first-team All-NAIA District 22 after leading Bluffton to the 1982 district championship and a 25-7 record. She led the team in kills (53), aces (13), serve reception percentage (.804) and digs (195) that season and was a team leader in almost every statistic throughout her four-year career.
00 points in four straight seasons. Gilbert twice led her team in assists and free throw percentage, and she is one of only a handful of juniors to serve as a Bluffton captain.
A native of Antwerp, Ohio, Hollabaugh scored 687 points and grabbed 421 rebounds in her career at Bluffton. Her point total ranked fourth when she graduated and her rebound total ranked third. Hollabaugh’s .771 career free throw percentage was a Bluffton record when she graduated and today is tied for fifth, while her 140 steals now rank eighth.
After several seasons near the bottom of the Hoosier-Buckeye Conference, the 1985 Beavers, led by seventh-year head coach Carlin Carpenter, exploded onto the NAIA small college football scene with an 8-1 record and ended the season ranked 11th in the nation. The 1985 squad was the kick-start to a five-year span where Bluffton teams notched a 44-13 record and took two trips to the NAIA national playoffs and is now the first team from that era to be inducted into the Bluffton Athletic Hall of Fame.
In 1985-86 she set the season mark—also still standing—for field goals made (165) while earning first-team Western Buckeye Collegiate Conference honors. The previous year she was second-team All-WBCC and honorable mention all-district. She led the team in scoring her last two years and was at the top in six statistical categories as a senior. An outside hitter on the volleyball team, she led Bluffton in service aces in 1985.
out volleyball player from 1983-86. Blosser’s 1985 volleyball team was enshrined in the Athletics Hall of Fame in 1996. She was also a three-year letter winner on the basketball court.
arned all-district honors twice. He is Bluffton’s career leader in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage. He also leads Bluffton ballplayers in triples and ranks sixth all-time in doubles.
Bluffton won the Oberlin Early Bird Tournament, was second in the Defiance Invitational and placed third in the Ohio Northern Invitational. The Beavers went 5-0 in the Western Buckeye Collegiate Conference during the regular season and 3-0 in the WBCC tournament before ending the year with a 1-1 record in the NAIA District 22 tournament.
the time of his graduation in 1989, Hemmert held 24 school records. His career totals that still rank among the best in Bluffton football history include: 5,614 yards of total offense (fourth), 4,951 passing yards (fourth), 290 completions (fifth), a .522 completion percentage (seventh), 39 touchdown passes (second) and a pass efficiency rating of 141.1 (second).
Beavers went to the NAIA national playoffs for the first of two consecutive years—and represent the third-most interceptions in a single season at Bluffton. A four-year letter winner, Williams was twice named to the NAIA District 22 first team and was a member of three Bluffton teams—the 1985, 1987 and 1988 Beavers—that have been inducted into the university’s Hall of Fame.
