Penn State Wrestling Fans!!!!!!!!
Just like that the collegiate season is once again over and it is time for my post season wrap up. It was not that long ago that we were getting ready for our first dual of the season and now we are a couple weeks removed from the NCAA tournament. Each year our teams have certain expectations placed on them whether fair or not and this team had a lot of those expectations from the beginning of the season, and they delivered on those expectations. There were only a couple of times throughout the year that we were at full strength because of sickness/injury etc. but the team came together when it mattered the most just like they do every year.
We finished the Big Ten regular season with victories over Maryland, Ohio State, Iowa, Rutgers, and Nebraska which allowed us to win our 10th Big Ten Dual title. In our last dual of the year the team posted a shutout in front of the 72nd straight sell out in Rec Hall. There were a lot of great battles in all of those duals but 2 of those matches that really stood out were against Rutgers where Terrell Barraclough and Lucas Cochran both bumped up a weight class and beat All-Americans in our annual BJC dual. These two have continued to get better and were ready when the opportunity presented itself and took full advantage of that opportunity. Coach Cael always talks about staying ready as you never know when it will be your turn. These two are perfect examples of staying ready.
Going into the Big Ten tournament we were not sure if we were going to be at full strength with an injury in our last dual of the year, but we knew we had a team that would step up regardless because that is the type of team they are. The Big Ten Tourney with all the parity in the conference is a very difficult tournament to win, especially without one of our national champions but the team took care of business. We were able to win the Big Ten Tourney with a Penn State Record 7 finalist and 170.5 team points. The most important stat though was being able to get all 10 guys to the National tournament after the wild cards came out which allowed us to go into the National tournament at full strength.
Next up was the National Tournament and going into the tournament there was a lot of talk about the seeds and how several of the seeds did not make much sense. Almost every year the same discussion is being had so not much has changed on that front. Regardless we knew the guys were ready to go and they did not care a whole lot about where they were at in the bracket. The guys proved why it does not ultimately matter where the committee thinks they should be placed in the bracket as they are going to let it fly one match at a time at the NCAA tourney.
Now for some of the stats on this Penn State Team before we move onto next year. We do not get caught up much in stats but they are good for recruiting and fun for the fans so here we go: it was the 11th Team title in the past 13 years, was most points scored in NCAA tournament history(172.5), largest margin of victory in NCAA history(100 points), first team to have two -4 Time NCAA Champions in the same year, only the 3rd time in NCAA history for a team to have 3 undefeated NCAA Champions(Penn State has the other 2 also), had the first true freshman in NCAA history to lose first round and wrestle all the way back to 3rd place, Aaron Brooks became the 6th Hodge Trophy winner under Cael Sanderson and 7th overall in PSU history, first time Penn State has had 6 NCAA finalist, and since 2011 PSU has had 96 All-Americans, 56 NCAA Finalist, and 38 National Champions. All those stats are great, and we have had some of the best wrestlers in NCAA history compete for PSU over the past 15 years, but we still have had some guys not quite accomplish their goals. This is what gets us up early and keeps us up late as we feel for those guys and try to figure out as a staff how to help them and others going forward. One of the great things about this sport is that you will never have it completely figured out and that is the challenge and what makes it fun.
Going forward the focus is now on the Olympic trials for some next weekend, U20 and U23 trials for others later in the summer, and a summer of training and getting better for the rest of the guys. We will have 15 current Penn State/NLWC members competing in the trials right here in State College next weekend so hopefully we see a ton of you there cheering the guys on. Lastly thank you again for all the support as the guys truly appreciate it.
GO LIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
