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Penn State Altoona will be making history this weekend.
One of the crown jewels of Altoona and Central Pennsylvania, the school where so many of us got our start will stage its first athletic Hall of Fame induction.
Two of the honorees, Tyler Franklin (Altoona) and Tim Wassell (Hollidaysburg), are well known in the local basketball and soccer communities.
Franklin played from 2003-07 and set the PSU Altoona scoring record, which still stands, with 1,533 points.
Wassell was a standout goalkeeper who later coached the Lady Lions to an unbeaten regular season and their first berth in the NCAA Division III tournament.
That launched him to Penn State, where he's been on the coaching staff for 12 seasons, now serving as associate head coach and having contributed to the 2015 NCAA title and several Big Ten championships.
Hall of Fame notification brings reflection and gratitude, and both Franklin and Wassell are touched.
Franklin said when he opened the letter informing him, "I'm not going to lie -- I cried."
"I put a lot of work into my game, (and) to be acknowledged in the first class is amazing," Franklin, a husband and father of three young sons who works in sales in Pittsburgh, said.
Despite being the top scorer on an Altoona Area High School team that advanced to the Western final in 2003 and lost to eventual PIAA champion State College -- a team it had beaten twice previously, including in the District 6 final under Kraig Hetz -- Franklin wasn't heavily recruited.
"I thought I had a good resume," he said, but the "only guy who wanted me" was the late Armon Gilliam.
"I wanted to play D-I, D-II ball," Franklin, 36, said. "Armon said, 'Come back here, you'll be at home, you'll play right away … (and) playing for an ex-NBA player and his style, I wanted to do it."
Franklin played two years for Gilliam and two for Alan Seretti, now the head coach at Dickinson, and wound up shooting 51 percent for his career.
He's almost equally proud that he's No. 5 all-time in assists -- "my buddies all kid me that I just scored" -- and was a standout in the Mansion Park Summer League as well.
Wassell had spent a couple years as an assistant coach for both the men's and women's programs at PSU Altoona under Jim Fee when opportunity knocked.
"It was the fall of 2007, Jim reached out to me," Wassell said. "He told me (athletic director) Fredina (Ingold) said that I was ready. I said, 'Ready for what?'''
To be head women's coach, Fee told him.
"I was 24," Wassell, now 39, said. "I had no idea what I was doing, especially in hindsight."
He leaned on Fee and men's coaches John Parente and Maurice Taylor, and his career launched.
"I tell people embarking on their coaching career not to think my path is a traditional one," he said. "I've gotten so lucky. I had incredible coaching."
Now, at Penn State, he works alongside Erica (Walsh) Dambach, who Wassell considers "one of the top coaches in the world."
Wassell and Franklin join an inaugural class that includes Ingold -- "the architect" of PSU Altoona's growth as a sports program, Wassell said -- along with former women's basketball standout Jillian Klinar, the 1995-96 women's volleyball team, coached by Tick Hedrick-Sheaffer, and men's basketball standout Richard Miller (1966-68).
Ingold and Miller enter the Hall of Fame as distinguished achievement Inductees.
"This induction will hopefully be a starting point to a celebration of the rich history of Penn State Altoona athletics, dating back to the college's founding in 1939 as the Altoona Undergraduate Center," Tom Koehle, chair of the Penn State Altoona Athletics Advisory Council, said.
"I'm so grateful for my time there and to be honored with Fredina makes it that much more special," Wassell said, adding, "Brent Baird has done an incredible job taking over for Fredina" and that "For local people, Penn State Altoona is still a hidden gem."
One that is shining brightly.
Rudel can be reached at nrudel@altoonamirror.com.