Joe Nix

Coach Nix single-handedly put wrestling on the map for Mesa Community College.  In addition to his induction this evening into the Mesa Sports Hall of Fame, Coach Nix is also in the Arizona and National Wrestling Halls of Fame. 

                Coming to MCC in 1966 after coaching at Arcadia High School from 1959-1961, Coach Nix’s teams were three-time Academic National Champions.  This recognition is perhaps his greatest moment as he always stressed rigorous studies in conjunction with team preparation.           Coach Nix was initially a basketball coach, a high school Industrial Arts Instructor, and a Physical Education teacher.   However, it was the Wrestling Program and the athletes he coached over the years that became principal.    Not only did he produce 11 All-Americans, he was responsible for taking the first US Team to the Junior Pan Am Games in El Salvador in 1976.  That was also the year his team won the Arizona Junior College Championship.  His son Jack was Captain of that team along with Mike Decker. 

                Coach Bob Minitti also got to share in the honors that year. 

                His son Joe also wrestled under Coach Nix for Mesa.   Perhaps the best wrestler ever at Mesa Community College, MCC Sports Hall-of-Famer Dr. Mike Medchill wrestled for Coach Nix as well.

                Coach Nix was also President of the Wrestling Coaches Association in 1977-78.  Highly decorated over the years, Coach Nix was honored in 1985 for his relentless efforts in working with Arizona’s high school athletes.  Further, his continued support of the AWARE Program, the Adult-Women’s-Active-Return-To-Education, also bears his father’s name, the Ed Nix AWARE Scholarship. 

                The impact Coach Nix as had on the lives of the individuals he coached and Mesa Community College as a whole is truly difficult to quantify.  Many of his former wrestlers are in attendance tonight as a testament to Coach Nix’s lifelong dedication to their lives.  The wrestling teams hold a reunion each year that Debby Hunt, one of Coach Nix’s assistants, helps make possible. 

                In addition to his countless hours coaching, he facilitated the construction of the Health Improvement Center with his best friends and fellow Hall-of-Famers Theo Heap and Carvel Jackson.   The beauty of that project was that the center was built at no cost to the taxpayers…all volunteer associates of Coach Nix. 

                “Coach Nix is one of my dearest friends and our families have been intertwined over the years.  When I heard he was being selected for this award, I made sure I’d be there.”- Theo Heap

                Coach Nix’s business card from those years at Mesa read “Nix is the Name…Wrestling’s the Game…Mesa’s the School, Wrestler’s My Tools.”