Olympic gold medalist continues revitalization of Morgan State's wrestling program
BALTIMORE - Kenny Monday, a three-time Olympian, is continuing to resurrect the Morgan State University wrestling program.
In its second year back, Morgan State, in Baltimore, has the only Historically Black College and University wrestling program in the country.
Monday, a 1988 gold medalist, has a vision to grow the sport in Baltimore.
"I want to have a footprint in the community where kids will dream about coming to Morgan State to wrestle," Monday said.
Morgan State's rebirth
The Morgan State wrestling program was restarted two years ago, nearly 30 years after it disbanded in the mid-1990s.
Monday is the catalyst for the revitalization.
"HBCU is always a special thing, and so when they dropped it, we were all broken-hearted, so the opportunity to bring it back meant a lot to me," Monday said.
The opportunity felt full circle for Monday. He didn't wrestle at an HBCU, but the connection to the program came through an old high school teammate.
"John Davis, he was signed to go to Morgan State, I was signed to go to Oklahoma State, and so I was trying to get him to go to Oklahoma State and he was trying to get me to come to Morgan State," Monday said. "I think he ended up winning, right? Because now I'm at Morgan State."
Growing the sport
Wrestling has taken the Olympic gold medalist and world champion all over the world, but he never imagined it would lead him to Baltimore.
"I didn't know that I really wanted to be a head coach because I was really more about the Olympic movement and coaching the Olympic guys and so I just think this is a special opportunity that came my way, and look at it as a godsend," Monday said.
Monday hopes to build the wrestling program into much more.
"I want to have Morgan State be a training environment for Olympic athletes, right, so as we build, I want to try and build the regional training center so guys can come in and train and try to make the world Olympic teams," Monday said.
NCAA aspirations
Morgan State competes in the Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association. The Bears are 4-12 this season.
The league championships will be held on March 7 at Lehigh University.
Monday told WJZ that Morgan State has enough talent that could help put the young program on the map and qualify for the NCAA Tournament, which in Philadelphia in late March.
