The late Dr. Laura Switzer and Sheryl Estes will be two of six inductees in the 2024 Class to enter the Panhandle Sports Hall of Fame at 2 p.m. on June 9, 2024 at the Amarillo Civic Center’s Grand Plaza. The six inductees will be honored, alongside coaches and athletes of the year from 2023-2024, in 11 sports, and five special award winners.
Switzer, a former Flying Queens All-American, and Estes, former Flying Queens coach who led the Queens to the NAIA National Championship final in 1992 are the ninth and 10th former player and/or coach from Wayland Baptist University to be inducted. This also marks the first time the PSHOF has selected two inductees from Wayland in one year.
Laura Mae Switzer
- McLean native
- 3x All-American basketball player for the Flying Queens of Wayland Baptist in the early 1960s
- Helped lead the Queens to a 90-12 record, one national AAU championship & two national runner-ups
- Scored 798 points in three years at Wayland and won three consecutive national free-throw shooting titles, first Queen to earn MVP honors at the AAU national tournament
- On the 1963 Pan American team that won gold over Brazil, 59-43
- Became the women’s basketball coach at Southwestern Oklahoma State in 1965, spent 36 years with the university
- Inducted into both the Wayland Baptist Athletics Hall of Fame & the Southwestern Oklahoma State Hall of Fame
She died on April 19, 2017, two days shy of her 76th birthday
Sheryl Estes
- Mobeetie native
- Ran track one year at Texas Tech, then transferred to play basketball at West Texas State under Bob Schneider in the early 1980s
- Coached 2 years at Canyon High School under Joe Lombard
- At 28, she became the Wayland Baptist women’s basketball head coach
- From 1989-96 she coached Wayland to the NAIA national tournament six times & the national title game in 1992.
- As head coach, she comprised a record of 183-62
- For two years, she was NAIA president and on the USA Basketball Selection Committee
- Start-up coaching job at Texas A&M Corpus Christi in 1998, compiled a 46-35 record for a beginning program
PSHOF Inductees from the Wayland Baptist Flying Queens program
1970 – Lometa Odom
1980 – Harley Redin
1994 – Jill Rankin Schneider
2000 – Dean Weese
2005 – Carmen Wynn Parks
2007 – Marsha Sharp
2014 – Cherri Rapp
2024 – Laura Mae Switzer
2024 – Sheryl Estes