Iowa State, Dec. 9
There were several bullet points to the speeches Tom Brands delivered to his wrestling team during the week leading up to its showdown with Iowa State.
Brands wanted to see his team in attack mode. He wanted to see his wrestlers finish shots, explode off the mat and hustle in all situations.
But there seemed to be one primary message leading up to the dual against the Cyclones: Perhaps more than anything — and likely a byproduct of all points of emphasis — Brands wanted to see Iowa take something away from the Cyclones in their home arena.
“When we had big opportunities, I think we did that,” Brands said after the fourth-ranked Hawkeyes took six matches from Iowa State and eventually seized the nation’s No. 1 ranking from the Cyclones, too, after a 20-13 victory.
“I like that. That’s what I liked about this dual meet.”
There was a lot for Brands to like.
Iowa owned a 23-11 advantage in takedowns, won the first four matches, picked up gritty victories from Joey Slaton and Dan LeClere, earned major-decision wins from Brent Metcalf and Jay Borschel and beat the Cyclones without defending NCAA champion Mark Perry Jr. in the line up.
Slaton used a reversal late in the second period and rode fourth-ranked Nick Fanthorpe for more than a minute in the third period to lock up the decisive riding-time point in a 6-5 win against the previously unbeaten Iowa State 133-pounder.
“I wrestled my game plan, stayed tough and kicked his (butt), basically,” Slaton said.
So did LeClere.
Although the Iowa sophomore couldn’t finish any of his shots early, he eventually capitalized when it mattered most, taking down No. 12 Nick Gallick with 42 seconds remaining and riding him the rest of the match for a 3-1 win at 141.
— Andy Hamilton