March 14, 2018
CLEVELAND - Less than 24 hours separates Penn State wrestling from taking to the mat to begin its quest for a seventh NCAA national championship in the last eight years. Ask any of the Nittany Lions though, and it's what they've been training for all year long, as noon tomorrow kicks off the first session of action at Quicken Loans Arena.
Prior to opening competition, Penn State senior Zain Retherford and Nittany Lion head coach Cael Sanderson joined a panel of selected head coaches and student-athletes for a question and answer session.
Check in on the top four takeaways from the pair of press conferences.
The Last One
Come
Thursday, Retherford will begin his quest to do something only one other Nittany
Lion has done in program history, win a third NCAA individual national
championship title. While the postseason is often a time for student-athletes
to look back on progress and accomplishment's, that's not something Retherford
will spend his time dwelling on.
"When it's over it's going to be over and it's going to come Saturday night," Retherford said. "It's like inevitable, it's going to be here, our season is going to be over. But until then I'm kind of just focused on scoring as many points as I can and just enjoying this moment, each moment as it comes. It's an opportunity and it's what we dream for all year long, so it will be fun."
A Simple Formula
When
it comes to winning an NCAA Championship title, the formula for Sanderson is
quite simple - beat everyone and score more points than anyone else.
"Regardless of what it took or why we're here, injuries or no injuries, this isn't who is the healthiest nationals, this is the national wrestling championship," Sanderson said. "If you want to win you've got to go score the most points."
A Learning Experience
Earlier
this week, when asked about where he's grown the most since he arrived at Penn
State, Retherford noted that when he first arrived, his focus was more on
winning and losing. Through his career though, Retherford has focused more on gratitude,
being thankful for his teammates, while also looking closer at how he can
improve his own skillset.
Rewind to this past summer, where he earned a spot on the U.S. Senior World Team, sending him to Paris, France to compete in the 2017 UWW Senior World Championships. Upon returning from a performance he noted he wasn't happy with, he still took plenty from the experience.
"Just one thing, I was pretty hard on myself for a little while after that for a few weeks," Retherford said. "And I think I just realized win or lose, not putting too much emphasis on the result, putting more emphasis on how much better is my wrestling actually getting is one thing that I focused on. After that, win or lose, that's kind of the end goal. It's never really, yeah, we want to win stuff, but are you having fun with it? Are you actually getting better? Are you adding more offense? And that's kind of what I focused on this season."
Welcome to Ohio
For
the first time since 1998, the state of Ohio is host to the NCAA wrestling
championships. Each coach was asked about what comes to mind in terms of the
state producing top wrestling talent. For Sanderson, it's personal connections
as well as a name Nittany Lion fans will surely know right away.
"Everyone's talking, I'm thinking about my coach, Bobby Douglas, he recruited a lot out of Ohio," Sanderson said. :My roommate, Joe Heskett, was from Ohio, four-time All-American, national champion, world medalist, one of the best friends. And Zach Thompson, Cleveland, Ohio, couple-time All-American. And we had a pretty solid kid from Ohio couple years ago in David Taylor."