Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/78634
TEAM EFFORT Most of Penn State's wrestlers attended the national tournament, with some driving to St. Louis to support the Lions' nine-man contingent. the year before in winning the 2010- 11 national championship. It was the most points in school history and the most by any Division I program in sev- en years. It was also 25.5 more points than second-place Minnesota amassed. "Winning team championships are rare," said 165-pounder David Taylor, who claimed his first NCAA crown along with the tournament's Most Outstanding Wrestler award, the Gor- riaran Award for the most falls in the least amount of time, and the NCAA's first-ever Most Dominant Wrestler award. "[Now] we have two in a row, and this year it wasn't even really close. Hopefully we can keep adding to it." Considering how young the Nittany Lions are up and down their lineup, there appears to be no reason to doubt the sensational sophomore's optimism. Two of three individual champions – Taylor and 174-pounder Ed Ruth – have two years of eligibility remaining, and two more of the school-record five na- tional finalists will return next season: 184-pounder Quentin Wright, a junior this season, and 125-pounder Nico Megaludis, a true freshman. Without Megaludis's unforeseen run to the finals, Penn State likely would not have put together one of the most dominating team performances in NCAA tournament history. The 10th seed entering nationals, Megaludis wasn't even picked to earn All-America status. Some early-season losses likely contributed to the lower- than-expected seed, but Megaludis ad- mitted he was "ticked." He went on to avenge four of those losses with victories over Minnesota's second-seeded Zach Sanders and Cor- nell's sixth-seeded Frank Perrelli. Both of those wrestlers had topped him twice this season. "I don't like losing," Megaludis said following his 7-4 quarterfinal victory over Sanders, a four-time All-Ameri- can. "Right before the match I thought, 'I can't let this kid beat me three times.' " He must have felt the same way about his overtime match with Perrel- li in which the first-time All-American secured a spot in his very first final. His opponent in the championship match – Iowa's two-time champ Matt McDonough, who defeated Megalud- Steve Manuel I T E O N L I N E . C O M A P R I L 1 1 , 2 0 1 2 21