Seymour announces 2023 Athletic Hall of Fame class

Two outstanding coaches, a former basketball star, a longtime sportswriter and a veteran broadcaster have been selected as the 2023 inductees to the Seymour High School Athletic Hall of Fame.

The inductees include Dave Boggs, who has coached the Seymour boys and girls swim teams for the past 39 years. That makes him the longest tenured varsity coach in the history of the school. His teams have won 715 dual meets with a winning percentage of over 71%. His boys teams have had 30 straight winning seasons, and his girls teams have had 29 consecutive winning seasons. Boggs has coached two individual state champions, seven conference champions and one Olympian.

Bob Bowman is a 1967 Seymour graduate who coached the Owls varsity baseball team for 31 years. His teams won 463 games, including four conference championships, five sectionals, three regionals, one semistate and Seymour High School’s first team state championship. Bowman was voted Indiana’s Baseball Coach of the Year in 1988 and received the prestigious Areal Skelton Award for his more than 30 years of work with Seymour’s American Legion baseball teams.

Andy Denny is a 1968 graduate of Seymour High School who was a three-year standout in basketball for the Owls. He’s the third leading scorer in Seymour history with 1,347 points, the fourth leading rebounder with 893 and has the highest career scoring average in school history at 19.2 points a game. Denny earned all-conference honors three times, was voted the team’s most valuable player three times and was named to the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame Silver Anniversary Team in 1993. Denny also was a two-year starter in baseball and helped the Owls win two conference titles and one sectional championship.

Arv Koontz has been covering Seymour High School sports for more than 50 years. He served as the sports editor at the Seymour Tribune from 1972 to 2001, then returned to The Tribune as a sportswriter in 2007 and is still working there today. Among the honors Koontz has received are the Corky Lamb Sportswriter of the Year Award, IHSAA Distinguished Service Award, Virgil Sweet Service Award from the Indiana Basketball Coaches Association and induction into the Indiana Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association Hall of Fame.

Bud Shippee is a 1970 Seymour graduate who was the radio voice for Seymour High School sports for 44 years. He broadcast the play-by-play for more than 2,600 Seymour football, boys and girls basketball and baseball games. Shippee’s previous honors include the State Media Award from the Indiana Football Coaches Association, Owls Service Award and Career Appreciation Award from Seymour High School and the Indiana Fever Silver Medal Award with induction into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame.

These five individuals will be inducted into the Seymour High School Athletic Hall of Fame prior to the Seymour-Jennings County varsity boys basketball game on Dec. 16.