Two-time NCAA Division I shot put national champion and current world No. 16 shot put thrower Jordan Geist will join the Slippery Rock University track & field program as a full-time assistant coach, according to an announcement Wednesday from SRU head coach Bill Jordan. Geist, a native of Saxonburg, Pennsylvania, is the son of SRU Hall of Fame throwers and current volunteer assistant coaches Jim and Judy Geist. He was a national record setting high school thrower at nearby Knoch High School, where he graduated in 2017 after being named the Pennsylvania Gatorade Player of the Year. Geist would go on to set the Arizona program records in both the indoor and outdoor shot put as well as the hammer throw. He swept the 2022-23 NCAA Division I national titles in the shot put and also finished third in the hammer throw at the outdoor national meet that spring. Over his incredible collegiate career, Geist earned 11 NCAA Division I All-America honors and was twice named as a first team Academic All-American.
While competing at Arizona, Geist also qualified for the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in 2021, where he placed seventh in the finals of the shot put. His second chance at the U.S. Olympic team came at the 2024 trials, where he narrowly missed a spot on the hardest team in the world to make with a fourth place finish in the shot put and a fifth place finish in the hammer. The performance was good enough to earn him a spot as a shot put alternate for the U.S. Olympic team. Geist has continued to throw internationally on the World Diamond League circuit as a professional and currently ranks as the No. 5 shot put thrower in the United States and the No. 16 shot putter in the world. He took fourth in the shot put at the U.S. Indoor Championships earlier this year and most recently finished sixth in the shot put and eighth in the hammer throw at the 2025 U.S. Outdoor Championships this summer.
Geist earned his undergraduate degree in business management with a minor in sports management from Arizona in 2020 and added two advanced degrees from Arizona as well. He earned a master’s in marketing in 2022 and a master’s in investment science in 2023. Geist, who currently resides in Phoenix, is in the process of relocating to western Pennsylvania and will officially begin his new role at SRU in November prior to the opening of the 2025-26 indoor track & field season.
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