The University of Utah Ski Teams—now in their 75th year—will receive the History-Maker Award for being the University of Utah’s most successful athletic program during their tenure. The award will be given by the U’s J. Willard Marriott Library at the 30th Ski Affair fundraiser on Oct. 26; the event benefits the Marriott Library’s Ski & Snow Sports Archive.

Over the seven-plus decades, the U’s Ski Teams program has set a record of 15 national championships. That remarkable record includes the 2019, 2021 and 2022 NCAA titles. What’s more, many of the prominent U skiers and snowboarders have gone on to see All-American, Olympic and international acclaim.

“We are delighted to receive the History Maker Award which recognizes 75 years of incredible performances and hard work by the Student Athletes and Coaches,” comments Fredrik Landstedt, director of skiing, “To be able to attend this year’s ski affair and receive this award is a great honor. The Ski & Snow Sports Archives is such a tremendous resource and we could not be prouder of our connection to the library’s Special Collections.”

Additionally, the library will be honoring posthumously the late Pat Miller, former U ski coach, with the S.J. Quinney Award for Outstanding Contributions to Skiing. Miller coached the U’s ski teams from 1974 to 2000, a period when the U won nine national collegiate championships, one men’s NCAA National Championship and one Women’s Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) National Championship.

In addition, during Miller’s 26-year tenure at the U, 251 ski team members went on to achieve All-American status, 46 were individual national collegiate champions and 10 were named members of the U.S. Olympic Teams. Many have been inducted into Halls of Fame across the country. Those accomplishments are at the core of the U’s 75-year-old ski program being the most successful in school history.

Miller, who died in 2013 at the age of 65, was a native of Mexico, Maine, where he was a four-year, four-sport high school athlete and the National Junior Cross-Country Ski Champion in 1965. While attending Ft. Lewis College in Durango, CO, he was named All-American in Nordic combined in 1970 and in 2001 was inducted into the school’s hall of fame. He was a member of the U.S. National Nordic Combined Team from 1968 to 1970 and an alternate on the 1968 U.S. Olympic team that competed in Grenoble, France. Miller’s other accolades include being Rocky Mountain Intercollegiate Coach of the Year, Coach of the Year at the U (1963), member of the Ft. Lewis College Athletic Hall of Fame, the Maine Ski Hall of Fame and the Intermountain Ski Hall of Fame. He also was the recipient of the Ski & Snow Sports Archives’ Sue Raemer Volunteer of the Year Award.

The third award to be given on Oct. 26 at the Ski Affair is the Sue Raemer Award, given to a volunteer who has made exemplary contributions to the Ski Affair. The award is named for the late Sue Raemer, a part-time Alta ski instructor and executive assistant to the director of libraries at the U’s J. Willard Marriott Library. In 1989 she co-founded the Archives with Dr. Greg Thompson, then assistant director for Special Collections at the library. When Sue passed away in 1995, the library, the Ski Archives board of volunteers and her husband John and sons Chris and Corey collaborated to establish the Sue Raemer Award. It recognizes a volunteer who exemplifies Sue’s zeal for community services and history. The winner will be announced at the event.