The Shadow
ATHENS, W.Va. – The Concord University Athletic Department has announced the 2026 Hall of Fame Class that will be formally inducted during Homecoming Weekend in October. This year’s induction will take place inside the Ballroom of the Dr. Jerry and Jean Beasley Student Center at 8:30 a.m. October 17.
The 2026 CU Hall of Fame Class is made up of six former athletes and one former head coach. The head coach is Andrew Wright who led the Concord baseball program to two conference championships in 2011 and 2013. The six former athletes are Ola Adams (football), Jeremy Bartley (men’s track & field), Chelsea Callaway Fields (women’s cross country/track & Field), Jonathan Gore (men’s track & field), Pam Vass Dunford (women’s basketball) and Alva Whanger (football).
The hall of fame class is voted on by a 10-member committee consisting of current Concord head coaches, athletic administrators, past hall of fame inductees, CU faculty and local community members. The voting process utilizes a points system via secret ballot to determine the selections for the hall of fame each year.
Per the Concord Athletic Hall of Fame by-laws, four nominees from this year’s ballot carry over to the 2027 ballot without needing a formal nomination due to receiving a necessary number of points this year: Rebecca Gleason, Tyler Kosut, Aaron Martinez and Stephanie Peareth.
Responsible for 157 wins in the dugout and two conference championships during his five-year tenure at Concord, Andrew Wright led the Mountain Lions to their first of two West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WVIAC) Championships in a three-year span in 2011. Wright also guided CU to its first program win in the NCAA Tournament that same season as the Maroon and Gray took down Winston-Salem State. Two years later, CU ripped off a then school-record 36 wins on its way to winning the WVIAC Tournament Championship. A year later, Wright was in charge of overseeing 38 wins for Concord which still stands as the single-season program record. Overall, he coached two All-Americans (Bret Blevins, Joey Miller), eight all-region players and 19 players earned all-conference on Wright’s watch. Wright joins four of his former players in the Concord Hall of Fame (Blevins, Chad Frazier, Miller and Devin Smith).
Long before he was on the staff of the Indiana football program that recently won the national championship, Ola Adams was one of the most revered defensive backs in the WVIAC. From 2004-07, Adams racked up 283 career tackles which ranks eighth in the storied history of the Concord football program. Adams recorded 36 pass break-ups which is tied for third in program history with 2025 hall of fame inductee Jeremiah Johnson. Adams also forced and recovered five fumbles in his career which are both top-five rankings at CU. To cap his career in the Maroon and Gray, Adams was twice named All-WVIAC First Team, earning spots in 2006 and 2007.
One of Concord’s first individual conference champions of the modern era, Jeremy Bartley rolled to a victory in the 800-meter run at the 1999 WVIAC Track & Field Championships. In 2000, Bartley was the WVIAC Champion in the 1,500-meters before assisting the 4×400-meter relay team to a conference championship. After serving in the United States Navy, Bartley returned to Concord to earn three podium finishes in the 2007 WVIAC Championships—third-place showings and All-WVIAC Honorable Mention in the 800-meters, 1,500-meters and 4×400-meter relay at age 29. From 1998-2008, Bartley owned the outdoor program record in the 800-meters (1:54).
Chelsea Callaway, now married Fields, was a pioneer for women’s cross country at Concord as she became the first athlete in program history to earn All-WVIAC First Team all four years of her collegiate career. She was sixth at the 2009 WVIAC Championship, fifth in 2010, ninth in 2011 and fourth in 2012. Her 2010 performance was instrumental in the Mountain Lions winning their first WVIAC Championship in women’s cross country. On the track, Callaway was the 2011 WVIAC runner-up in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, earning All-WVIAC Second Team. She was All-WVIAC Honorable Mention, a pair of third-place finishes, in the 10,000-meters in 2010 and the steeplechase in 2012. Her time of 11:29.57 in the steeplechase from the 2011 season remains the program record at Concord.
Rounding out the track & field inductees in this year’s class, Jonathan Gore was a conference champion in the Mountain East Conference era as he sprinted his way to the conference title in the 200-meter dash in 2017. He was second in both the 100-meters and long jump that same spring, leading to Gore being named the MEC Championship Meet MVP—one of five in program history. Overall, Gore was a seven-time All-MEC performer, including earning All-MEC in the long jump all four years of his collegiate career. With his long jump prowess, Gore was named to the All-Atlantic Region Team in the long jump during both the indoor and outdoor seasons in 2017, and he still holds the school record for the indoor (7.14 meters) and outdoor (7.16 meters) long jump.
Pam Vass, now Dunford, was instrumental in the success of Concord women’s basketball in the late 1980s and early 1990s. She was a three-time All-WVIAC selection that culminated with her being voted to the All-WVIAC First Team at the conclusion of the 1990-91 season. She earned All-WVIAC Second Team the season prior. During her junior season of 1989-90, Vass helped the Mountain Lions to the WVIAC Tournament Semifinals as she landed on the All-WVIAC Tournament Team. In terms of career ranks, Vass was a 1,000-point scorer at Concord and sits 15th in career points (1,150) and ninth in made field goals (546). Nearly half of Vass’s career points came during her senior season when she poured in 543 points, ninth most for a single season at CU. Vass also had two seasons in her career where she shot 55 percent or better from the field.
Alva Whanger will be inducted into the Concord Hall of Fame posthumously. Nearly 100 years have past since Whanger became Concord’s first All-WVIAC First Team athlete in any sport in 1928. Seven more years would come and go before the Mountain Lions had another All-WVIAC First Team player on the gridiron with the selection of Charles Baxter in 1935. Throughout his collegiate career, Whanger helped Concord to five straight winning seasons, posting a record of 25-12-5. The 1926 Mountain Lions posted a sport a mark of 6-1-1 with Whanger on the roster as the team only allowed three points for the entire season, recording seven shutouts.
