SANDY STEVENS RECEIVES ORDER OF MERIT FROM HALL OF FAME 
 For more than three decades, Sandy Stevens has been speaking for and about wrestling. A leader among the sportÕs vast corps of volunteers, Sandy has been Òthat lady announcerÓ at hundreds of events ranging from high school dual meets to the Olympic Games. 
 The full-time journalist from Glen Ellyn, Ill., has been chosen by the Distinguished Members of the Hall of Fame to receive the 1998 Order of Merit. The award will be presented at the June 6 Honors Banquet. 
 Sandy and her husband, Robert "Bear" Stevens, are 1964 graduates of Northern Iowa, where he wrestled for Hall of Famer Bill Koll. After three years as a high school assistant coach, Bear became the first head coach at brand-new Kennedy High School in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The first home meet was a quadrangular and the coach needed an announcer. 
 "I was on maternity leave," Sandy recalls, "but since I would be there anyway, Bear asked if I would sit at the microphone, welcome people and assign wrestlers to the two mats. I already was a certified referee, the first woman in Iowa and probably one of the first in the country, so I felt I had the right background. 
 "Now, this has never been a feminist, women's lib thing," she emphasizes. "I just wanted to prove to myself that I understood the rules and the philosophy of wrestling." She's been explaining the rules and philosophy to wrestling fans ever since. 
 In their third year at Kennedy, the school played host to the USA Wrestling district freestyle tournament. After she announced that, she was invited by Bob Siddens to work the state freestyle. "Then Dave McCuskey and Gary Kurdelmeier showed up and asked me to call the first Junior Nationals at the University of Iowa. That led me to announcing Iowa dual meets, and began my association with USA Wrestling," Sandy explains. 
 And what an association that has been! Sandy has announced all 27 of the Junior Nationals, traditionally the world's largest tournament. The past two years, combined with the Cadet Nationals, the week-long spectacular has topped 3,500 entries and 7,000 matches across as many as 23 mats. She has worked USA Wrestling nationals at all levels, including Seniors, along with Olympic and World team trials. 
 After calling Division III and Division II NCAA tourneys, she joined Ed Aliverti at the Division I nationals in 1982 and they have been the premiere collegiate announcing team ever since. They worked together at the Olympic Games of 1984 in Los Angeles and again in 1996 at Atlanta. 
 On her own, she has announced Cadet, Junior, Espoir and Senior World Championships, the Pan American Games of 1987, the Midlands Championships since 1985, all of the National High School Folkstyle tournaments in Pittsburgh, state high school tournaments in such far-flung locations as Florida, Arizona and California, and a host of regional, national and international events. 
 A few years ago, Sandy and Bear were on vacation in Sydney, Australia. Strolling along the beach, they noticed a sign announcing an Òinternational wrestling tournamentÓ at a gymnasium less than a block away. They decided to check it out, and ran into a surprising reception. 
 Wrestlers and coaches greeted her enthusiastically, "Hey, Sandy, what are you doing here?" They were high school exchange teams from the states of Washington and Ohio, all veterans of "her" Junior Nationals. Even halfway around the world, The Lady Announcer couldn't escape her wrestling public. 
 But then, she never wanted to.