Ed Giese established a very high standard as a competitor and a coach. He had record success in both high school and college with multiple honors nationally and internationally, before beginning a 37-year run as a coach at the college, national and state levels. 

One of his first major accomplishments was winning the Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation championship in 1977 competing for the Franklin Park Raiders. The 1981 graduate of Fenton High School in Bensenville was an Illinois High School Association Class AA champion at 98 pounds in 1979 with a 45-0 record and a Class AA champion at 105 in 1980 when he also went 45-0 before suffering his first defeat in three seasons in the state quarterfinals and finishing fifth at 112 in in Class AA in 1981 with a 45-1 record. He concluded his Bison career with a 172-5 record. He won 132-consecutive victories from 1978-79 to 1980-81, an IHSA record that would stand for 32 years and he still ranks third overall. He finished his prep career with 114 falls, another IHSA record that stood for 12 seasons. He also was the USA Junior Freestyle champion in 1981. 

In college, he still holds the record for victories at the University of Minnesota, where the 1986 UM graduate went 159-34-3 from 1982-1986 competing for Wallace 'Wally' Johnson, a 1986 Distinguished Member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. He finished as an NCAA Division I All-American in 1986 after taking third place at 118 and was a four-time national qualifier. He also won Big Ten Conference titles at 118 in 1984 and 1986, took fourth and third in his other two seasons and was the Big Ten Wrestler of the Year in 1986 and was a four-time letter winner for the Golden Gophers. In off-season competition while in college, he was a five-time US Open Freestyle Finalist, 12-time Freestyle and Greco Roman All-American, a Pan Am champion and 13-time International Freestyle tournament winner and a Junior World Freestyle place winner. In 1987, not only did he win the Midlands Championship at 118 lbs. representing the Gopher Wrestling Club, he also received the Dan Gable Most Outstanding Wrestler Award. 

He began his coaching career as an assistant at Minnesota from 1986-88, assisted at the University of North Dakota in 1988-89 and at Northwestern University from 1989-92, helping lead the last two schools to fourth-place NCAA finishes while coaching one champion and four All-Americans at both. After serving as the USA Wrestling Women's Head Coach and an assistant coach at the Junior World Championships in 1993, he was an assistant and head coach at the Dave Schultz Wrestling Club from 1996-2005. From 1996-2008, he was a USA Wrestling coaching pool assistant, where he coached numerous Olympic champions and medalists. He was the Team Illinois USA Wrestling Junior Dual Coach from 2008 to 2013, winning two team championships. From 2008-23 he was a coach, clinician and camp director at a variety of Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation, High School and MMA clubs in northern Illinois. And in 2022-23, he was a Hungarian National Team coach and the U17 Head Women's coach. 

Ed was inducted into the Illinois Wrestling Coaches and Officials Association Hall of Fame in 1994 and also received the Lifetime Service Award from the IWCOA in 2020.