Olympians Hali Flickinger, Kyle Salyards Lead Pennsylvania Aquatics Hall of Fame Class of 2025
Olympians Hali Flickinger and Kyle Salyards lead the members of the Class of 2025 to the Pennsylvania Aquatics Hall of Fame.
Joining them are fellow Olympian Tom Tretheway, diver and official Dave Lewis, swimmer and coach Mel Nash and coach Don Miller.
Flickinger represented the United States at the 2016 and 2020 Olympics. The native of York and graduate of Spring Grove High attended the University of Georgia, where she and the Bulldogs won three national titles. She finished seventh in the women’s 200 butterfly at the 2016 Olympics, then returned to Tokyo, where she captured bronze in both the 200 fly and 400 individual medley.
Flickinger’s career includes two relay gold medals in the 800 free relay at the World Championships, plus two silvers in the 200 fly; gold in the 400 IM at the 2022 World Short-Course Championships, plus silver in the 200 fly and relay bronze; gold in the 200 fly at the Pan Pacific Championships in 2018; and two individual bronze medals plus relay gold at the 2015 World University Games.
Salyards made the U.S. Olympic team in 2000, part of a long and storied history of breaststrokers from the Commonwealth. The Lancaster native attended Hempfield High School and Georgia. He finished sixth in the 200 breaststroke at the Sydney Olympics. Three years later, he won gold at the Pan American Games in the 200 breast.
Tretheway was also a breaststroker, starring at Mount Lebanon High School after being born in Gary, Indiana and raised in California with George Haines’ Santa Clara Swim Club. He also swam for Doc Counsilman at Indiana. Tretheway won the NCAA title in the 200 breast in 1965 as well as the medley relay title. He was the AAU outdoor champ in the 100 breast that year. Tretheway finished ninth in the 1964 Olympics in the 200 breast.
Lewis spent 42 years as a PIAA official, working the PIAA Championships 22 times. He competed there in high school, the Haverford High grad a 1963 state diving champion. He later coached at Upper Darby High. Lewis was a long-time member of the District 1 Steering Committee, overseeing swimming and diving in the Philadelphia suburbs, and spent more than 20 years as a rules interpreter for his chapter of officials.
Miller founded and spent 23 seasons coaching varsity swimming and diving at Shippensburg University (1972-92 for the men, 1972-75 for the women). A four-time PSAC Coach of the Year, he led the team to 13 national championships and only one losing season, on the way to a 236-69-1 record. Recognized as a CSCAA Master Coach and a recipient of the ASCA’s Award of Excellence, he was inducted to the school’s hall of fame in 2009. The natatorium was named in his honor in 1993. Miller died in 2021.
Nash was a standout at Gateway High, the Monroeville native named Swimming World’s High School Swimmer of the Year in 1972. He won seven PIAA championship, eight WPIAL titles and was named the 1972 Pennsylvania Athlete of the Year. Nash won gold in the 100 backstroke at the 1971 Pan American Games and made Team USA for the first two FINA World Aquatics Championships. He won Worlds gold in the 400 free relay in 1973 and bronze in the 100 back in 1975.
Nash was a 15-time All-American and eight-time Big Ten champion at Indiana University. He began coaching at age 22 at the University of Texas and later led Texas A&M for 25 years, including to a top 10 finish at NCAAs in 1999. Nash has continued to coach at North Florida Swim Club. He’s coached swimmers who’ve participated in 10 of the last 12 Olympics.
The Class of 2025 will be recognized at the 2025 Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association Swimming and Diving Championships at Bucknell on March 15. The PA Aquatics Hall of Fame Dinner will follow in the spring.