PELLA—A pair of national tournament performers and an athletic training pioneer are the newest members of the school's Athletics Hall of Honor.
           
Jamie Bermel '86, a top-25 NCAA Division III men's golf finisher and now the University of Kansas men's golf coach, will be inducted along with Iowa's NCAA Woman of the Year nominee in 2006, two-sport standout Katie Pederson Whipple '06, and Central's first full-time athletic trainer, John Roslien.
           
As part of Central's homecoming celebration, a banquet for the honorees is set for 6:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 26 in the Harry and Bernice Vermeer Banquet Hall in the Graham Conference Center. The banquet is open to the public but there is a charge for the meal and reservations are required.

Established in 2002, Central's Hall of Honor is intended to recognize those who were not only exceptional performers in the athletics arena as a student-athlete, coach or administrator, but who have distinguished themselves in life after graduation through service and leadership. To be eligible for consideration, a nominee must have graduated or served as a Central coach/administrator at least 15 years earlier. This year's inductions will raise the hall's membership level to 75.

A rotating nine-member selection committee includes alumni from four different eras (prior to 1980, 1980-89, 1990-99 and 2000-09) as well as two alumni at-large, along with athletics director Eric Van Kley and two other staff members.

Nationally prominent coach--Bermel has served as Kansas head coach since 2012 and has piloted the Jayhawks to a record nine consecutive NCAA regional tournaments. He's coached 24 NCAA regional tournament teams overall, having previously coached at Drake University (1992-97), Iowa State University (1997-99) and Colorado State University (1999-2012) and guided four teams to the NCAA national meet. He was a three-time Missouri Valley coach of the year while at Drake.

Bermel's Kansas teams have won 17 regular-season tournaments including the Hawkeye Invitational in Iowa City April 13-14. His squads won 18 titles at Colorado State, where he coached PGA Tour veteran Martin Laird. He was a three-time Missouri Valley coach of the year honoree at Drake, and coached PGA standout Zach Johnson, who won the 2007 Masters and 2015 British Open.

At Central, Bermel helped the Dutch claim four Iowa Conference titles and make four NCAA Division III Championships appearances. He played in three of those NCAA tournaments as Central placed sixth in 1984, fifth in 1985 and 12th in 1986. Bermel tied for 76th in 1984, tied for 47th in 1985 and placed 23rd at the 1986 NCAA meet, receiving All-America honorable mention. A team co-captain in 1985-86, he was given Central's Golden Putter Award as the most improved player that year. Bermel received all-conference recognition in 1985 by placing seventh at the league tourney.

He received a master's degree at Purdue University in 1988 and worked in recreational sports at the University of Michigan from 1989-91 before joining the staff at Drake.
As an inductee, Bermel will join his older brother, John Bermel '84, who was inducted in 2013. The Bermels are among four sets of siblings who are Hall of Honor members. Others are Rich Kacmarynski '92 and Mark Kacmarynski '96, Kevin Sanger '93 and Rick Sanger '96 and Raegan Schultz Wagner '04 and Lindsay Schultz Janke '04.
 

Two-sport standout--Whipple was named the NCAA Woman of the Year for the state of Iowa in 2006 and was among 10 Division III finalists for the national award. She was also tabbed as the Iowa Conference Female Scholar-Athlete of the Year.

She was a Central team co-captain in two sports, serving in volleyball in 2004 and 2005 along with track and field in 2005 and 2006. In volleyball, Whipple was the 2005 conference MVP and was a two-time all-conference pick. A two-time conference female athlete of the week, she was an AVCA Division III All-Central Region selection in 2004 and won Central's Jamie Hill MVP Award in 2005.

Whipple helped Central win a share of the 2002 conference title and outright crowns in 2003, 2004 and 2005, leading the team to NCAA Division III tourney berths those three seasons.
In track and field, she was a two-time conference champ and five-time placewinner. She took first in the high jump at the 2006 indoor and outdoor meets.

She served as Central's Student-Athlete Advisory Committee president and as representative to the college's board of trustees. A Senior Honors Scholar, Whipple was involved in numerous mission activities and received Central's Prins Sportsmanship Award in 2006.

After graduating in 2006, Whipple did graduate work at Loyola University, earned a master's degree at Iowa State University and returned to campus as a coordinator for the federal Educational Talent Search program as well as an adjunct sociology instructor and assistant junior varsity volleyball coach for two seasons. In 2012, Whipple became a program advisor for TRIO Student Support Services at Iowa State before taking over as director of the Academic Success Center there in 2017. She was secretary for the Iowa TRIO Organization Board of Directors from 2011-17. In 2021 she was selected to participate in Iowa State's Emerging Leaders Academy. In 2022 she became director of development with the Iowa State University Foundation, serving the Ivy College of Business Development Team.
Whipple, who lives in Ankeny, is also in her third year as president of the Rock Creek Elementary Parent Teacher Organization and since 2011 has taught Sunday school at St. John's Lutheran Church, where she is a church council member. And since 2023 she's served as a volunteer AAU coach for Centennial Volleyball Academy.

Athletic training leader—Roslien was an athletic training pioneer at Central. He was named Central's first full-time head athletic trainer in 1986, although he initially also served as equipment manager and assistant baseball coach, holding the latter post for seven seasons. When he arrived on campus, the athletic training room consisted of a training table and whirlpool wedged into a tiny room adjacent to the men's varsity locker room in P.H. Kuyper Gymnasium. A new athletic training room was added in H.S. Kuyper Fieldhouse when the building was constructed in 1987 and it has since been expanded and renovated. The program blossomed under Roslien's leadership, attracting numerous students to the program and the full-time staff grew. Roslien, who is a University of Iowa graduate and earned a master's degree at Western Illinois University, gave up his hands-on duties to become athletic training education program director in 2003 and joined the faculty, completing his Central career as associate professor of kinesiology before retiring in May.

Under Roslien's leadership, Central's athletic training program was accredited in 2004 by the Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Training Education. During his tenure, 200 Central program graduates have earned BOC certification as athletic trainers and numerous others entered different health-related fields.
He was inducted into the Iowa Athletic Trainers Society Hall of Honor in 2007 and earlier was the group's president, following stints as vice president, public relations director and district treasurer. In 2012, Roslien received the NATA Service Award, recognizing his contributions to the profession. He was inducted into the Mid-American Athletic Trainer Association Hall of Fame in 2015. He was also a member of the NATA International Committee and MAATA representative to the NATA PAC.

Roslien has extensive international experience as well. He spent a year as a physical education teacher in Tarsus, Turkey and was Central's academic liaison to the college's international study at Bangor University in Wales.

For 20 years, he was director of football operations for the Division III all-star team at the Tazon de Estrellas game and its predecessor, the Aztec Bowl, in Mexico. He continues to serve as a tour coordinator for Global Football, traveling the world with other American teams.

From 2011-25 he was a faculty athletics representative with the American Rivers Conference. He received a Central Presidential Service Standards Award in 2002.