DECISION MAJOR Dominant from start to finish,
Penn State romps to another national title, crowning three champs along the way
S 20 T I M O W E N | B L U E W H I T E C O N T R I B U T O R
T. LOUIS, Mo. – They couldn't get the white T-shirts over their heads and onto their torsos fast enough. Some start- ed to put them on backwards. Others went elbow-first into the sleeve, eager to try on the
new threads. Cael Sanderson appeared reluctant
to put his shirt over the dark gray suit jacket he was wearing. Only after four Nittany Lion wrestlers encircled him and coaxed him into it did he give in. Within a matter of minutes, almost
all the Penn State wrestlers, along with some coaches and trainers, had donned the brand new shirts. On the front of each, in blue and white block letters, the words read: 2012 NCAA Di-
A P R I L 1 1 , 2 0 1 2
vision I Wrestling National Champions. They were stamped with the NCAA seal, just in case it wasn't official enough already. It was no wonder the beaten and bat-
tered student-athletes were grinning from cauliflower ear to cauliflower ear in all the pictures. Their exuberance was both obvious and understandable. Penn State, led by three individual NCAA champions, had just put the fin- ishing touches on its second nation- al title in as many years, and its wrestlers did so in record-breaking, can't-get-much-better-than-that style. By the time the tournament ended
Saturday night at the Scottrade Cen- ter, Penn State had racked up 143.5 team points – 36 more than it compiled
W W W . B L U E W H