Jim Fallis graduated from Durand High School, where he was a member of the National Honor Society and lettered in Football, Track and Wrestling.

He started wrestling his sophomore year and spent most of the season behind Dave Holek, a state champion who, after graduation, attended MSU.

The only year he qualified for the Class B State Championships was his senior year, where he took second to defending state champion Jack Wiley of Vicksburg.

He went on to attend Lake Superior State and during his four years of collegiate wrestling was undefeated in dual meets. The only loss to a Michigan Collegiate wrestler occurred his freshman year losing to John Matthews at the Michigan Collegiates.  He avenged that loss the following year in the same tournament in the finals.

•          In only his fourth year of wrestling, his first year of collegiate wrestling, he placed second at the NAIA National Championships and finished his freshman season with a 24-2 record.  While competing for Lake Superior State University, he was a 4x NAIA All American finishing 2nd, 4th, 1st and 1st.  He also won the 1974 NCAA D3 National Championship, where his was voted Outstanding Wrestler and won the Most Falls award.

•           He completed his intercollegiate wrestling career with a 142-19-1 record and was Lake Superior State's first All American and National Champion.

He had accepted a graduate assistantship at NMU after college, when in the spring of his senior year at Lake State, he was offered and accepted the head coaching position.

At the age of 21 he became one of the youngest head college coaches in the country.

In 1980 he was inducted into his first Hall of Fame when the NAIA inducted him as an Athlete.

He coached @ Lake Superior State for 12 years earning 3 Conference Coach of the Year honors.

He was the Athletic Director at Lake State for 7 years. Jim's first task as AD was to replace himself as wrestling coach. That was easily done by bringing in Clemson assistant coach, Tom Borrelli, who brought the Lakers to new heights in wrestling. During that time, he also hired Jeff Jackson who won 2 of it's eventual 3 Division 1 NCAA Hockey Championships. Jackson is now the head hockey coach at Notre Dame. 

Jim also instituted a number of, at the time, innovative marketing plans including advertising on the ice hockey boards, selling advertising on the scoreboards and tying season ticket sales to donation levels.

After seven years as AD at Lake Superior State, Jim accepted the same position at the University of Northern Colorado (UNC).

While at UNC, they hosted two NCAA Division II National Wrestling Championships and it was at UNC that the first Division II finals were held on an elevated stage and set a Division II National Championship attendance record.  

Jim has served on and chaired numerous Division II and Division I committees. While on the Division I Championship Committee, the current method of qualifying for the Division I championships was instituted. This determined selection to the championship based on a wrestler’s performance in the current year and replaced the wildcard meetings and the awarding of national championship positions based on historical data. 

In 2001 Jim was inducted into the NCAA Division II Wrestling Hall of Fame for his contributions to the sport.

While at UNC the football team won back to back Division II National Championships.

After 11 years at UNC Jim took the position at Northern Arizona University where he served for 8 years before retiring in 2012. Under his guidance, Northern Arizona won their first ever Big Sky Presidents Cup reflective of athletic and academic success. He hired their first Track and Field coach who was to win a NCAA Division I Mens Cross Country Championship, the first team championship of any kind in school history.

Northern Arizona won 29 Big Sky Conference Championships and garnered 27 Coach of the Year honors during his 8 years as AD.

While Northern Arizona did not sponsor a wrestling team, Jim stayed connected and active in the ongoing development of the sport by serving all eight years as the Division I liaison to the Championship Committee.

Following his retirement Jim became the Executive Director of Beat the Streets New York and served in that very important role for three years.  

Since 2015 Jim has remained involved in college wrestling by helping the National Wrestling Coaches Association with the Divisional Leadership Group program. Jim serves as the facilitator for the eight divisional college coaches groups.

Jim was inducted into the Northern Colorado Hall of Fame and the North Central Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (NCC) Hall of Honor for his accomplishments at Northern Colorado and into the Lake Superior State Hall of Fame for his accomplishments as an athlete, coach and administrator.  

In June of 2022 Jim was inducted into the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA) for his lifetime achievements in college athletic administration.