General | July 12, 2016

PHILADELPHIA - This summer, the world's elite athletes will compete for gold at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio. No Explorers will participate as athletes this year, but La Salle University has had a storied history of its athletes competing on sports' biggest stage.
 
La Salle has sent 16 athletes to the Olympic a total of 22 times, with three earning gold medals and two capturing bronze.

Its first Olympian, Joe Verdeur, '50, earned a gold medal in the 1948 Olympic Games in London, winning the 200 breaststroke in an Olympic record time. He set 19 world and 21 American records in the 200-yard and 200-meter breaststroke during his career.
 
One reason for Verdeur's success was his "overhand return" style of swimming the breaststroke.  Eight years after he won gold, his style became its own Olympic event, the butterfly. Legendary writer Grantland Rice called Verdeur the greatest swimmer of the first half of the 20th century.
 
The most recent Olympian from La Salle came in 1996, when Derek Brown, '93, represented the  U.S. in team handball. A track athlete and basketball player at La Salle, he had never seen team handball before the U.S. team began training on campus a few weeks before his graduation.
 
He declined an invitation from the coach to try out, since he already had a job lined up. But three months into the job, he quit to pursue a spot on the national team handball squad and became one of the top scorers on the team that qualified for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta.
 
Another Explorer, John McIntyre, '50, competed in the 1948 Olympics as a member of the United States pair with coxswain in rowing.
 
Al Cantello, '55, was a world record-holder and member of the first class of inductees into La Salle's Hall of Athletes. He competed in the 1960 Olympic Games in the javelin.
 
Ira Davis, '58, is the only Explorer to qualify for three Olympic Games. Davis, a former American record holder in the hop-step-jump (now called the triple jump),  participated in the Olympics in Melbourne in 1956, Rome in 1960, and Tokyo in 1964.
 
He nearly won a bronze medal in the event in 1960, missing by two centimeters. "I was fortunate to participate in three Olympics," Davis told the Philadelphia Tribune. "I'm really proud of that."
 
Two Explorers, Hugh Foley, '66, and Stan Cwiklinski, '66, manned the same shell in the 1964 Olympic Games in the gold medal-winning men's eight with coxswain.
 
Diane Moyer, '80, and Kathy McGahey, '82, were key members of the 1984 bronze medal-winning field hockey team in Los Angeles. Moyer also earned a spot on the 1980 U.S. Olympic team, which boycotted the Olympics in Moscow, joining Michael Brooks, '80 (men's basketball), and Bill Belden, '70 (rowing). Brooks had been named the captain of the 1980 men's basketball team.
 
Edwin Borja, '80, and his brother, Edgar, '84, who competed for the Philippines, are the only set of Explorer siblings in the Olympics. Edwin competed in 1972 in Munich and 1976 in Montreal, while Edgar was a member of the 1980 Phillippines contingent that boycotted the Games in Moscow.
 
More recently, Explorers Eric Buhain, '91, and Frank Lescas, '93, represented their countries in the Olympics. Buhain swam for the Phillippines in 1988 in Seoul and 1992 in Barcelona, while Lescas was the only member of the Albanian Olympic swim team in 1992.
 
Diane Bracalente, '87, represented the United States in field hockey in 1988 while serving as the University's Assistant Director of Student Life. She is believed to be the only La Salle employee to reach the Olympics.