Mike and Marty Lordemann, twin brothers, Greeley West High School graduates and longtime soccer coaches in the area, started coaching decades ago because of an interest in sports and working with athletes.
The men, now 56, never imagined they and their family would be inducted into the Greeley West High School Hall of Fame for their collective accomplishments.
“You never think twice about the final destination,” Mike Lordemann said. “I’m still almost in awe of the fact they recognized us. Look at the six previous classes. They’re phenomenal people, coaches and athletes and people leaving a true legacy.”
A committee of Greeley West High School Hall of Fame members felt the same way about the Lordemann brothers, who with their children will be inducted into the school’s hall of fame Friday evening.
The Lordemanns will be be part of this year’s hall of fame class class with teachers Peggy Freemole, Rachel Hammer and Edith Reynolds; the 1975 state championship baseball team; and the following state champion athletes: wrestlers Ryan Martinez, Aaron Phillips, Austin Waterman and brothers Joseph Martinez and Emilio Martinez, as well as golfer David Oraee.
The ceremony begins at 6 p.m. in the high school auditorium. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. for photos and tours of the building.
Instead of selling tickets to the ceremony, donations will be accepted and a silent auction will go on from 5:30-7 p.m. All proceeds will support the hall of fame and the Greeley West Booster Club.
A reception and cocktail hour will begin about 7 p.m. at The Tavern at St. Michael’s, 2918 67th Ave. in Greeley. The reception is free and open to the public.
The class is the seventh to be inducted into the hall of fame dating to 2009. Selected by a committee of hall of famers, the Greeley West Hall of Fame blends members from different segments of the school. Principal Jeff Cranson called the hall of fame “unique.”
“In 2023, we had a military officer inducted (U.S. Air Force Brigadier General Heather Wyatt Blackwell),” Cranson said. “We have well-rounded students and graduates, and we’re recognizing the great things happening in the classroom and out of the classroom at Greeley West.”
Members in the hall of fame accept nominations and vote on the classes every two years, Cranson said. The last class was inducted in 2023, which was the first induction since 2014. Cranson said the hall of fame had a hiatus, which was extended by the COVID-19 pandemic.
This year’s faculty inductees, Freemole, Hammer and Reynolds, have about 100 years of combined teaching experience.
Freemole has been in District 6 for 42 years, Cranson said, and her work at Greeley West included teaching theater and coaching the school’s pom and dance teams. Freemole is working part time this year in her final year as musical director.
Hammer taught English for more than 34 years, and Reynolds taught social studies for more than 20 years.
Greeley West performing arts teacher Peggy Freemole, left, speaks to the Tribune during rehearsal for “A Fond Farewell: Bidding Adieu to the Greeley West Theatre” in the auditorium in Greeley West High School in Greeley on March 3, 2022. (Greeley Tribune file photo).Mike and Marty Lordemann were the first members of their family to attend Greeley West, starting in the early 1980s. They were instrumental in starting the school’s soccer program before graduating in 1985.
Later, both men found their way back to Greeley West as coaches for more than 40 years total in boys and girls soccer and Mike also coached basketball.
Mike Lordemann credited their parents, Ray and Mary, for their interest in sports. Ray and Mary drove them to games and practices when the boys were young.
Mike coached at Greeley West from 1988-2016. Mike’s girls soccer teams won back-to-back girls state championships in 2003-04. Marty coached the boys program from about 2010-22. He was later an assistant with the girls program.
All of Mike and Marty’s five children between them graduated from Greeley West, giving the family a connection with the school of more than 60 years total. Marty and Mike’s sister, Sheila, graduated from Greeley West in 1987.
Mike and Marty are now coaching together with the Windsor High School girls program. Mike Lordemann is the Windsor head coach, and Marty is an assistant.
Windsor girls varsity soccer coach Mike Lordemann yells to his team from the sideline during the Wizards’ second-round state tournament game in May 2024 against Evergreen at H.J. Dudley Field at Windsor High School. (Alex McIntyre for The Greeley Tribune)“You coach to help kids,” Marty Lordemann said. “I was a mentor and a parent to kids. I ran the gamut with the group. Would I change a minute of it? Not for a second.”
Mike’s daughters, Ashley, Brittney and Caeley, graduated in 2007, 2010 and 2016, respectively. All three played soccer and basketball. Caeley also played volleyball.
Marty’s sons, Gunnar and Luke, graduated in 2013 and 2016, respectively. Gunnar was a cheerleader, and Luke played football and soccer.
Caeley Lordemann sprints through drills while training at the Future Legends Complex Dome in March 2024 in Windsor. Lordemann is a former Greeley West and Colorado State soccer player. (Jim Rydbom/Staff Photographer)The state championship winners in individual sports will go into the Hall of Champions with qualification starting 10 years after graduation, Cranson said. The Hall of Champions is a new section of the school’s Hall of Fame.
David Oraee, a University of Colorado Boulder senior and Greeley West High School graduate, during a University of Oregon invitational in March 2014 in Eugene, Oregon. (Greeley Tribune file photo).The state championship winners going into the hall of champions are David Oraee, the 2010 Class 5A state golf champion, who went on to play at the University of Colorado Boulder; and state championship wrestlers, Ryan Martinez (1999 and 2000); Aaron Phillips (2004); Joseph Martinez (2009, 2010 and 2011); Emilio Martinez (2010, 2012 and 2013) and Austin Waterman (2012 and 2013).
Ryan Martinez won heavyweight state titles and spent time in prison in the early 2000s before competing in mixed martial arts.
Phillips died in June 2019 in a car crash at age 33. He was the athletic director and a teacher at Wiggins High School at the time of his death.
Joseph Martinez coaches wrestling at Greeley West. He wrestled at the University of Virginia after winning three state titles for Greeley West.
The Denver Post said in 2010 Joseph Martinez and his younger brother, Emilio, became the first set of brothers from Greeley to win state wrestling championships in the same year. Emilio Martinez also won three titles and followed Joseph to the University of Virginia.
Waterman won the 220-pound title as a junior and the heavyweight title as a senior. He was 88-1 in his final two scholastic seasons with 81 pins, according to a story in The Denver Post.
Greeley West’s Emilio Martinez as a scholastic wrestler for the Spartans. (Greeley Tribune file).The 1975 state championship Spartans baseball team will also be honored on the 50th anniversary of its title won at Jackson Field in Greeley.
The team remains the only public school from Greeley to have won a state baseball title, according to its coach, John Christensen. Christensen, who turned 85 this month, was a teacher and coach at Greeley West from 1968-82.
He coached baseball from 1968-75 and football from 1968-77. Christensen was later the principal at the former John Evans Middle School and Greeley Central High School. Christensen was a member of the inaugural class of hall of fame inductees at Greeley West in 2009.
In 1975, the Greeley West baseball team defeated Denver North 3-2 in the state semifinals and pounded Grand Junction 15-4 in the final.
Christensen said the state title team would not have happened without the Spartans winning Northern League titles in 1971-72 and 1974-75.
“I remember that we felt like we’d been denied long enough, the state championship,” Christensen said. “We felt like we had the raw material to get it done, and it was a matter of making it happen. That was the driving force. We couldn’t have won the state championship without 1971-74. Those were the building blocks. The closeness and togetherness of the team was special.”
The members of the team were, in addition to Christensen: assistant coach Larry Brunz, assistant Juils Jorgensen, student-teacher coach Dan Shaffer; players, Rod Scheller, Mike Edgerton, Johnny Martinez, David Villa, Rick Vatt, Mike Kronick, Jon Bressler, David Bressler, Ken Hibler, Terry Haverluk, Everett Finger, Steve Mallett, Kirk Evenson, Wayne Hendrix and student manager Rod Harr.
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