University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Titans

UW-Oshkosh Hall of Fame Adds Three Members

(L-R): Lisa (Melendez) Van Wyk, Tom Taraska, Tara (Harding) Jaeger

The University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Hall of Fame increased its membership to 150 with Sunday’s (May 4) inductions of Tara (Harding) Jaeger, Tom Taraska and Lisa (Melendez) Van Wyk. The induction ceremony was held at UW-Oshkosh's Reeve Memorial Union.

The UW-Oshkosh Hall of Fame was established in 1974 to give tribute and deserved recognition to former athletes, coaches and friends of the university. It is also intended to enhance school tradition by honoring those people who have shown exceptional ability while on the UW-Oshkosh campus and since graduation.

2008 Inductee Tara (Harding) Jaeger

Of all the sports at UW-Oshkosh, none is more decorated with national championships than women’s track and field.

For the past 22 years, UW-Oshkosh head coach Deb Vercauteren has built a legacy of successful indoor and outdoor track and field teams that have earned a combined 21 Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) titles and 14 National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division III championships.

The program’s success would not have been possible without the dedication of excellence-driven individuals like Tara (Harding) Jaeger, Vercauteren said.

Winning back-to-back NCAA Division III titles in the long jump and earning 11 All-America titles in indoor and outdoor track and field from 1993 to 1997, Jaeger is one of the many athletes who have helped build Vercauteren’s winning tradition.

Attracted to UW-Oshkosh by the women’s gymnastics program, the Fond du Lac native decided early in her freshman year that her athletic experience at UW-Oshkosh would take her on a different path – one that ended in track and field.

Making her mark as a rookie, Jaeger earned top conference honors in the indoor triple jump and All-America status on the outdoor 400-meter relay team. She also contributed to the team’s sixth consecutive indoor conference title.
In 1994, Jaeger built on the success of her triple jump career and earned sixth place and All-America honors at the NCAA Division III Indoor Championship. This individual success helped the Titans to the national team title. Jaeger also claimed the indoor conference triple jump title and helped the Titans win the outdoor league team title.

Buying into Vercauteren’s winning mentality that an athlete should never settle for less than their best, Jaeger set a school record with a jump of 18-10 to win her first of two NCAA Division III indoor long jump titles and earned second place in the national triple jump competition in 1995. She also took indoor conference titles in both the long and triple jumps and the 800-meter relay to earn the title of Outstanding Field Athlete at the conference meet.

Clinching consecutive indoor national and conference long jump titles and a third consecutive national team title in 1996, Jaeger credits much of her jumping success to former assistant coach Evan Perkins.

With two years of eligibility left in the outdoor season, Jaeger earned All-America titles in the long jump, triple jump and the 400-meter relay, conference titles in the 100-meter dash, 200-meter dash, long jump and 400-meter relay and school records in the 100-meter dash, long jump, and 400-meter relay. These accolades were grounds for Jaeger's selection as the 1997 NCAA Division III Athlete of the Year. Both conference and national team titles followed Jaeger's individual achievements in both 1996 and 1997.

Carrying the focus, discipline and leadership skills learned at UW-Oshkosh into her classroom, Jaeger has become a successful and respected seventh-grade mathematics teacher at Sabish Middle School in Fond du Lac. She also coached track and field at high schools in both Campbellsport and Fond du Lac.

Jaeger's husband, Joel, ran on the UW-Oshkosh men’s track and field team under current head coach John Zupanc. As if the Jaegers didn’t do enough running in college, their 3-year-old son, Miles, who with the endurance of his father and speed and power of his mother is predicted to dominate in future steeplechase competitions, keeps them on the run.

2008 Inductee Tom Taraska
Coaching, mentoring and motivating teenagers since graduating as a student-athlete from UW-Oshkosh in 1975, Tom Taraska is recognized by many as the most successful high school football coach in Wisconsin.

Taraska, who suited up in the so-called “Golden Age” of Titan football, will tell you that everything he is and everything he teaches today was learned on the football field and in the classrooms at UW-Oshkosh.

Remaining in close contact with several of his college coaches, Taraska continues to draw inspiration from these men who led the 1972 Titans to an 8-2 record and the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) championship.

Upon graduating with an education degree from UW-Oshkosh, Taraska started his coaching and teaching career at Franklin High School. He remained at Franklin for seven years before taking a job at Hartland's Arrowhead High School.

Taraska, who completed his 26th season as head football coach at Arrowhead High School last fall, has produced four Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association (WIAA) Division 1 state championship teams, the most recent in 2007, four WIAA Division 1 state runner-ups, a WIAA Division 1 state-record 39 postseason victories, three undefeated and nationally-ranked teams and an overall record that most coaches only dream of reaching, 233-91.

Along with inspiration from his days as a UW-Oshkosh football player, Taraska credits much of his coaching success to the character of his players, the support of the Hartland community and Arrowhead administration and what all highly successful coaches admit to having – a little bit of luck.

Taraska coached 12 high school All-Americans, 34 All-State players and numerous collegiate athletes. The most recognizable Arrowhead alumni include former University of Wisconsin quarterback Tyler Donovan, former University of Wisconsin defensive tackle Nick Hayden, who was selected by the Carolina Panthers in the sixth round of the 2008 NFL Draft, and former Dallas Cowboy, Baltimore Raven and Tampa Bay Buccaneer center Mike Solwold.

Taraska was chosen as the 2007 Associated Press State High School Coach of the Year. He also is a three-time Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel Area Coach of the Year (1993, 2002 and 2007) and a three-time Wisconsin Football Coaches Association District Coach of the Year (1991, 1996 and 2002).

As a testament to Taraska’s pride for his players, respect for his school and vision for his team, his 2007 state championship team was presented rings designed to represent the past, present and future success of Arrowhead High School football.

On the rare occasion Taraska had a free moment in the last 11 years, he was scheming under Loren Seagraves’ guidance to develop a nationally-recognized physical education program known as Club Arrowhead – a cutting-edge class on the development of successful and well-rounded high school students. He also has given clinic presentations at several Big 10 universities. Taraska graduated with a master’s degree from UW-Whitewater in 1992.
Giving back to the UW-Oshkosh community, Taraska served as the first President of the College of Education and Human Services Alumni Association from 2006-07. Taraska remains a board member of this organization. He also is a lifetime member of UW-Oshkosh's National "O" Club.

Taraska currently resides in Brookfield with his wife, UW-Oshkosh alumnus and former pom-pon performer, Sue Anne.

2008 Inductee Lisa (Melendez) Van Wyk
Lisa (Melendez) Van Wyk entered the highly successful women’s track and field program at UW-Oshkosh by trying to be good at a sport she wasn’t great at, said her head coach Deb Vercauteren.

This is a bold statement, considering Van Wyk won back-to-back National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division III outdoor track and field titles in the 400-meter run and contributed to eight UW-Oshkosh conference and national team championships in 1995 and 1996.

What Vercauteren was referring to however, was the fact that Van Wyk stepped onto a track for the first time at age 20. Previous to her track and field experience at UW-Oshkosh, Van Wyk's athletic achievements were on the basketball court, where she played guard and was a member of the University of Miami’s (Fla.) women’s basketball team that won the 1992 Big East title and advanced to the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA Division I Championship.

National championship titles weren’t the only awards earned by Van Wyk during her two-year career in track and field at UW-Oshkosh. The Pompano Beach, Fla., native also accrued 10 All-America titles, eight Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) titles and helped break the 400-meter relay school record with a time of 47.53 in 1996. She once held five records at one time, including the outdoor 400-meter run mark that held for 10 years.
Within the first few months of her track and field career in 1995, Van Wyk took home indoor All-America honors in the 55-meter dash and 1,600-meter relay. The rookie also claimed the conference indoor title in the 200-meter dash. She then went on to become an outdoor national champion in the 400-meter run while earning All-America accolades in the 200-meter dash and the 1,600-meter relay. At the 1995 WIAC Outdoor Championship, Van Wyk obtained first-place medal in the 1,600-meter relay.

Although Van Wyk put more pressure on herself during her second year of track and field, 1996 proved to be as successful as her rookie showing. Van Wyk raced to a third-place finish in the 400-meter run at the NCAA Division III Indoor Championship while taking home first-place trophies in the 400-meter run and the 800-meter relay at the WIAC Indoor Championship.

The 1996 outdoor season featured a national title in the 400-meter run and All-America awards in the 200-meter dash, 400-meter relay and 1,600-meter relay. In the conference, Van Wyk was a part of first-place finishes in the 400-meter run, 400-meter relay, 800-meter medley relay and 1,600-meter relay.

Since graduating from UW-Oshkosh in 1997, Van Wyk has taught biology and chemistry while coaching girls' basketball and track and field in the Appleton Area School District. She also earned her master’s degree in microbiology from UW-Oshkosh in 2003, and has served as an accountant, project coordinator and vice president for Steel Homes by Design, LLC.

Currently, Van Wyk is an IT Manager and Consultant for Appleton Lathing Corporation, the freshman girls' volleyball coach at Hortonville High School and an active member in the Appleton Alliance Church.

Van Wyk lives in Fremont with her husband, Tim, and their children, Peter and Nicole.