01/11/2026
Coach Greg Henning coached varsity wrestling for 35 years and spent 32 years as a high school teacher and head wrestling coach. His coaching stops included Sallisaw High School (4 years), Stilwell High School (3 years), Tuttle High School (21 years), and Norman High School (4 years). While he produced tough wrestlers, state placers, state champions, and All-State athletes at all four schools, the majority of his program success came at Tuttle.
Greg began his coaching career at Central State University in 1977–78. Working alongside Jim Rogers, he helped coach a team that finished 4th at the National Tournament, led by David James, a future Hall of Fame coach and national runner-up that season.
As Greg finished his final season at Stilwell, Tuttle began its first year of high school wrestling, finishing 0–12. When Greg took over as head coach the following season, Tuttle improved to 7–6 but had no state qualifiers. That season marked the only time Greg watched the State Tournament from the stands. By his third season, Tuttle was the 1988 State Runner-Up. The following year, Tuttle hosted the inaugural Class 3A Dual State Tournament. Seeded fourth, the Tigers defeated Perry in the semifinals and Marlow in the finals to claim the title.
Under Greg’s tutelage, Tuttle won six Dual State Championships and finished runner-up three times. They captured five Individual State Championships and five State Runner-Up titles, along with six Academic State Championships. Across all four schools, Greg coached 115 state placers and 43 state champions, including two four-time champions, six three-time champions, and five two-time champions. He coached 29 All-State wrestlers, eight Outstanding Wrestlers at State, and two father/son state champion combinations. His three sons—Jeff, Jared, and Ryan—won a combined 11 state titles, the most ever by siblings in Oklahoma.
During the spring and summer seasons, Greg coached not only his own wrestlers but athletes from across the state in freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling. He led top wrestlers on cultural exchange trips and to national tournaments. Greg served as head coach and team leader for U.S. All-Star teams to Japan in 1979, 1995, and 1998, and organized Japanese All-Star team visits to Oklahoma during those same years. He also coached All-Star teams on tours of Europe, including England, Germany, Italy, Belgium, France, Poland, Hungary, and Switzerland.
Greg served many years as one of four members of the OSSAA Wrestling Advisory Rules Committee and was selected multiple times to the Wrestling All-State Selection Committee. He coached the West All-State Team in 1989 and served as Vice President of the Oklahoma Wrestling Coaches Association from 1995–96 and President from 1997–98.
Upon his retirement from Tuttle in 2006, the Tuttle High School wrestling tournament was renamed the Greg Henning Invitational, and the school’s expanded athletic facility became the Greg Henning Activity Center. Greg was inducted into the Oklahoma Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2004 for his lifetime service to wrestling. In 2024, he was inducted into the Oklahoma Coaches Hall of Fame, and later that year, the Henning family received the Leroy and Madalene Smith Family Award from the National Wrestling Hall of Fame’s Oklahoma Chapter.
Please help us welcome Greg Henning into the Bob Stegall Hall of Fame!
