Dennis Mitchell, one of the longest-tenured coaches in the league and a 14-time Mid-American Conference Coach of the Year, is in his 17th season at The University of Akron.

In all, he has received the league’s top coaching honor 10 times for his women’s teams and four times for his men’s Teams. Additionally, Mitchell has earned Great Lakes Region Outdoor Coach of the Year recognition from the USTFCCCA on four occasions; twice each for the men’s and women’s teams.

Known for his high-energy home track meets, Mitchell has not only made Akron’s Stile Athletics Field House the home of Mid-American Champions, but a destination for some of the top indoor talent in the northeast United States with the annual Akron Invitational.

In the past six years alone, Mitchell, who oversees both the men’s and women’s indoor and outdoor teams, has guided UA to 13 Mid-American Conference Championships while producing 22 All-Americans, earning 52 All-America honors.

Of that esteemed group, two have gone on to win NCAA Championships. Christi Smith captured the heptathlon crown in 2000 and Steve Large won the hammer in 2009. Additionally, a total of 98 Academic All-MAC honors have been bestowed upon UA student-athletes during Mitchell’s tenure, including Mary Varge, a three-time CoSIDA Academic All-American, seven-time MAC Champion and five-time USTFCCCA All-American.

Most recently, Mitchell has orchestrated a historic rise on the men’s side that saw the program sweep both the MAC Indoor and Outdoor titles for the first time in 2011 after winning back-to-back outdoor crowns in 2008 and 2009.

Last winter, the men finished the outdoor campaign ranked fifth in the region and advanced 14 individuals to the NCAA East Regionals and four to the NCAA Championships. There, Willie Brown, who set school records in the indoor and outdoor 800-meters in 2011, earned All-America First Team honors while also qualifying for next year’s Olympic trials.

The men’s rise follows a dominating run from the women’s program that featured five consecutive indoor titles from 2005-’09 and four straight outdoor championships from 2006-09. Furthermore, Akron became just the second school in league history to sweep the men’s and women’s outdoor championships in 2008 and then repeated the feat in 2009.

The streak of championships began in the 2005-06 as Akron women’s cross country team won a MAC championship to proceed the indoor and outdoor track and field championships, marking the first time a MAC women’s team had won the league’s “Triple Crown.”

With his success, it was no mystery as to why Mitchell was the United States head men’s track & field coach in the Norwich Union International meet, which was held in August of 2006 at Alexander Stadium in Birmingham, England. Fresh off the MAC triple crown, Mitchell kept his winning streak alive as the USA men’s team finished first, winning 11 of 16 events and scoring 177 points to runner-up Russia’s 146. The coaching stint was his second on a national team as he served on the staff at the 2003 Pan American Junior Championships, working primarily with the throwers and decathletes.

While winning the MAC’s Triple Crown in 2005-06 was a notable first, the crowning achievement of Akron track and field occurred in June 2000 when Smith captured the NCAA championship in the heptathlon. After earning the first national crown for Akron, Smith went on to represent the University at the 2000 Olympic Track and Field Trials in Sacramento, Calif.

Then, in 2009, Large followed suit by becoming the program’s second national champion in the hammer after finishing as the national runner up during the indoor season in the weight throw. Large set a number of school and MAC records under Mitchell’s tutelage as she was named MAC Outdoor Field Performer of the Year for three consecutive years while becoming the first MAC female student-athlete to win a league title in a field event four times.

After making her first appearance at the NCAA Championships in 2007, she returned in 2008, earning All-American honors in the weight throw (indoor) and hammer (outdoor), while winning the NCAA Mideast Region title in the hammer.

A former pole vaulter himself and widely regarded as one of the top vault coaches in the nation, Mitchell, who also coaches the UA multi-event athletes, is overseeing a new era in Akron track and field. The Zips have one of, if not the, premier indoor facilities in the nation to call home with the opening of the $20 million Stile Athletics Field House in August of 2004. Stile Field House features a 300-meter, six-lane Mondo track, a 100-yard astroplay field as well as throwing cages, jumping pits and several pole vault apparatus.

In addition to the numerous All-America honors garnered by UA student-athletes, Mitchell’s Zips have also produced 167 individual MAC Championships and seven relay champions.

In the seven years under the current regional system for the outdoor season, UA has seen athletes qualify for a total of 206 events in NCAA regional competition, including 32 in both 2007 and ‘08 and 30 in 2009. Akron has also had at least one All-American performer in 13 out of the last 14 years.

In 2006, four Akron student-athletes garnered six All-American honors, marking the fourth-straight year UA had at least three honorees. High jumpers Sako and Tomasz Smialek each garnered the distinction during both the indoor and outdoor seasons. John Russell (pole vault) and Ashley Kaufman (javelin) were All-American selections during the outdoor season.

In recent years, it has been the achievements of Mitchell’s pole vaulters which has propelled the program into the national spotlight.

Russell became a four-time All-American with his performance at the 2006 NCAA Indoor Championships. The league’s indoor champion that year, Russell finished third in the men’s pole vault, clearing a MAC-record 18-02.50 along the way. In 2004, he was the first MAC student-athlete ever to clear 18-feet indoors.

Kira Sims, who completed her eligibility in 2004, became a three-time All-American in the pole vault and was the first female in UA and MAC history to clear the 14-foot plateau both indoors and outdoors. Sims placed fifth at the 2004 NCAA Indoor meet after winning the league’s indoor crown. During the outdoor season, she again won the conference title, adding the Mideast Regional title before placing fourth at the NCAA Outdoors. She closed out her career in the Blue and Gold by placing fourth a second time at the NCAA Outdoors and 11th at the U.S. Olympic Trials.

Not to be diminished in any way are the accolades of the rest of the team. Along with Russell and Sims, Beata Rudzinska earned All-American recognition both indoors and outdoors in 2004 and ‘05 and completed her career with a total of five national honors. A middle-distance specialist, Rudzinska, an 11-time MAC Champion, had eight victories in the MAC 800 meters and four victories in the MAC mile, not to mention a 2005 MAC individual championship in cross country.

The 2005 season saw the women win its first MAC indoor title, tallying 97 points to top the 13-team field, defeating second-place Eastern Michigan by 1.5 points. The men’s squad placed fourth, which was the best-ever finish for the men indoors. For his effort, Mitchell earned his first MAC Women’s Indoor Coach of the Year honor. During the 2005 outdoor season, the women finished in second place, falling seven points short of their second outdoor MAC title. However, the Zips women’s squad came all the way from 10th place on the final day of competition to have a shot to pull the indoor-outdoor title sweep. On the men’s side, Akron took fifth place, moving up three places from its eighth-place showing in 2004.

In 1999 the women captured Akron’s first-ever outright women’s MAC team championship by claiming the league’s outdoor title. Seven school records were set at the meet, led by Smith’s 5,528 points in the heptathlon. Additionally that season, three athletes snagged indoor and/or outdoor All-American honors. Smith earned both indoor and outdoor recognition after finishing ninth in the long jump at the indoor meet and second in the heptathlon at the outdoor championships with a UA and MAC-record 5,773 points. Varga was ninth in the outdoor high jump, and Chad Bullett became the first male from the track program to earn Division I All-American honors with a 10th-place finish in the 100 meters.

Accomplishments like these were almost unimaginable prior to Mitchell’s tenure. He was hired during the summer of 1995, and inherited a program mired in the MAC basement. The men had finished last that spring at the league’s championship meet, 22 points behind ninth-place Ball State. The UA women’s team had also finished last, 30 points out of ninth place. Four years later, the women earned almost seven times as many points on their way to the league title. The men have also made great strides, increasing their point production each year.

For 10 years, from the fall of 1985 until his appointment at Akron in 1995, Mitchell gained invaluable experience as an assistant coach at Texas (six years) and North Carolina (four years).

As field events coordinator under 1995 NCAA Men’s Indoor Coach of the Year Dennis Craddock at UNC, Mitchell helped direct the efforts of 20 Atlantic Coast Conference champions and 13 All-American performances. In his first season in Chapel Hill, the Tar Heel men won their first ACC track and field title (1992) in more than 30 years, and followed that with three straight titles over 1994 and ‘95.

North Carolina won ACC outdoor crowns each year sandwiched around an indoor championship in 1995. In the meantime, UNC’s women followed a 1992 ACC outdoor team championship with indoor-outdoor conference sweeps for the next three seasons (1993-95).

His prize pupils included: 2000 Olympian Lynda Lipson, who finished runner-up in the javelin at the 1992 NCAA Championships; Ingrid Hantho, who placed fourth in discus at the 1994 NCAA Outdoor Championships; and pole vaulter and former Akron assistant Kevin Brown, the first collegiate athlete in the state of North Carolina to clear more than 18 feet.

Prior to serving with the Tar Heels, Mitchell served as assistant field events coach under legendary coach Stan Huntsman at Texas from 1985-91. He tutored four All-American pole vaulters, aiding hurdlers and decathletes as well. The Longhorns captured Southwest Conference titles in 1986 and ‘87, and finished in the NCAA Outdoors top-five from 1986-89 and again in 1991. During Mitchell’s time in Austin, Huntsman was tabbed as head coach for the 1988 U.S. Track & Field Olympic Team.

Among Mitchell’s other track & field-related responsibilities is his national-level involvement with USA Track & Field and the U.S. Track and Field Coaches Association. He is an active member of the USATF pole vault development committee and is currently a National Junior Elite Coach. He also serves on the USTFCCCA/USATF Joint Task Force for the Improvement and Retention of College Track and Field.

Mitchell is a native of Rialto, Calif., and a 1985 graduate of Abilene Christian University. While at ACU, he was a pole vaulter on the Wildcats’ 1985 NCAA Division II Championship team. Mitchell began his collegiate career at the University of Utah, where he was twice the Western Athletic Conference runner-up in the pole vault. Mitchell, 51, and his wife, Cindy, reside in Green and have two sons; Matt, (26) and Chad (24).