Examining Some NCAA Wrestling Bests

Since we love this stuff.

Aug 17, 2024

There’s something about lists.

Put simply, we love them, especially rankings’ lists. Best places for steak? Best MLB pitcher of all time? Worst NFL fans? We’ve got lists for ‘em.

Lists are easy to compile. What they rank matters most: What’s exciting about a random list of colleges when we can rank them in order of who’s the party-est?

Now we’re talking.

We love lists because topics can run the gamut. Ain’t nothing off limits in ListLand. And they aren’t complicated. We understand them, whether we agree with them or not. Lists are their own, simple, literary genre.

Need to scratch that nagging Who are the greatest competitive hot dog eaters in history itch?

Takeru Kobayashi (Credit: The Morning Call)

Well, Joey Chestnut, Takeru Kobayashi, and Miki Sudo, of course.

You’re welcome.

A trait of any list of consequence is that it summons three reactions: Agreement. Disagreement. Rage.

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So without further ado, I’ve compiled my own list. It’s one exclusively made up of My Number Ones from the world of college wrestling, the top/best of this or that.

Most Goosebump-Giving National Championship Final Match (D1): Anthony Robles (Arizona State) vs. Matt McDonough (Iowa).

It helps that ESPN carries the NCAA Wrestling Championship finals each year. A wider audience was able to find out who Robles is, and how remarkable it was to be where he was that night. Forget that Robles was born without a right leg and even able to wrestle at the D1 level. He wrestled for the Sun Devils and thrived, bagging three Pac 10 titles leading up to that March evening in 2011.

As wrestling fans know, Robles won. At the conclusion of his victory over returning national champ McDonough, broad-shouldered, gnarly-eared men throughout Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Arena attempted to blame their red, glassy eyes on the pollen count.

I’m not crying! You’re crying!

For all the right reasons, Robles’ title in the 125-pound weight class is at the top of chill-giving NCAA-final moments. Hollywood apparently agrees. A movie about Robles’ life - starring Jennifer Lopez as Robles’ mother, Judy, and Don Cheadle as ASU coach Shawn Charles - is scheduled to be released next month at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival.

Robles’ final match against McDonough.

Greatest College Wrestler to Win Only One National Title: Alan Fried, Oklahoma State

Choosing the greatest college wrestler of all time begins and ends with picking from those who’ve won four titles - an elite company of seven. Pat Smith (Oklahoma State), Cael Sanderson (Iowa State), Kyle Dake (Cornell), Logan Stieber (Ohio State), Yianni Diakomihalis (Cornell), Carter Starocci (PSU) and Aaron Brooks (PSU) are the residents of college wrestling’s (current) Mount Rushmore.

Strongest arguments for Sanderson stem from his career record. Sports Illustrated - not known for its copious college wrestling coverage - ranked Sanderson’s 159-0 record as the second most impressive feat in college sports history. Sanderson’s unblemished record sits only behind Jesse Owens’ four-world-records-day in 1935 at the Western Conference (now Big Ten) championships.

But who’s the greatest college wrestler of all time to only win one NCAA title?

Easy. Alan Fried.

Remember: This is the greatest college wrestler with only one title. That Bruce Baumgartner, Kenny Monday, Kendall Cross and a few others are one-timers who went on to more celebrated international careers doesn’t matter on This List. We’re talking college records and resumes only.

And Fried’s career with the Cowboys is the most impressive.

He’s second to John Smith in career victories at Oklahoma State. His overall record was 129-6, though he lost to only two different wrestlers. Five of his six losses were to Iowa’s 3-time NCAA champion (and eventual World, World Cup and Olympic Champion), Tom Brands, with two of those losses coming at the NWCA All Star meet. Fried also beat Brands. His only other loss was to Nebraska’s Dave Droegemueller during his freshman season.

Fried never finished lower than 2nd at the NCAAs, making it to the finals all three times he competed at the national tournament. Sanctions on the Cowboys’ program prevented Fried and his teammates from participating in the postseason Fried’s junior year (1993). In his first two trips (1991, 1992), he lost to Brands in the finals. In his last attempt (1994), he beat Fresno State’s Gerry Abas.

For perspective, Fried doesn’t know what its like to wrestle in the consolation bracket of a college tournament.

He now runs the Big Game Wrestling Club in Belgrade, MT. This week, Fried shared about his YouTube channel, Collar Tie. Whether watching him in some high school, college or freestyle battles, catching him jam some Grateful Dead on his guitar, or checking his acting chops starring in a no-budget break-dancing flick, Fried’s channel has enough shaky, VHS-shot footage to make many of a certain age reminisce. And smile.

Fried, in Snakedance, 1984

Most Dramatic Pin in NCAA Final History: Tie: Rob Rohn (Lehigh) over Josh Lambrecht (Oklahoma); Bill Kelly (Iowa State) over Brad Penrith (Iowa)

Both comeback pins registered on NCAA-final Richter scales. In Rohn v. Lambrecht, Rohn overcame an improbable deficit, providing first-hand proof that Yogi Berra’s axiom is more than just motivational fare. It ain’t over ‘til it’s over, indeed, because craziness actually happens.

Rohn’s pin was crazy. Lambrecht was all but crowned the national titlist, up 14-3 with riding time, when this happened.

Rob Rohn vs Josh Lambrecht: Miraculous pin for 2002 NCAA title

***

Kelly v. Penrith: All season long, Dan Gable’s Hawkeyes wore the Roman numeral “X” on their singlets. The legendary coach’s team was after an unprecedented 10th consecutive NCAA title, and their uniforms reminded everyone of that.

Up 3-2, top seeded Penrith attempted a single leg with just under a minute remaining in the match. Kelly went for some 1987 funk, securing college wrestling’s most historic spladle and one of its rarest pinning combinations, and the match was over.

It would have been dramatic even if the team score hadn’t hung in the balance. At that time and moment, Kelly’s pin was precisely what Iowa State needed to thrust a dagger into HawkeyeInvincibility. The Cyclones won the tournament with 133 points to Iowa’s 108. Kelly’s teammate, Tim Krieger, defeated Iowa’s Jim Heffernan in another Iowa/Iowa State final showdown, and Cyclone wrestlers Stewart Carter and Eric Voelker added individual championships of their own.

But the drama and momentum switch were on full display with Kelly’s pin.

1987 NCAA: Bill Kelly (Iowa St) vs Brad Penrith (Iowa)

Most Dominant Performance in an NCAA Title Bout:

Mitch Clark (Ohio State) vs. Vertus Jones (West Virginia)

Any answer that isn’t Clark over Jones is objectively wrong. All Clark did in the 177-pound national finals - for the first and only time in D1 history - was register a technical fall victory over Jones.

And Clark did it in the first period.

Case closed.

Clark vs. Jones