Editor’s Note: Dan Gable, the legendary wrestler and coach, recently spoke with WIN editor Mike Finn about what are the most important elements in college recruiting.

            WIN: College coaches are pretty much wrapping up their recruitment of high school wrestlers. Should national ranks of those wrestlers mean anything to coaches?

            Gable: Yes. They certainly should mean something. If they don’t, then you don’t have the proper people doing the rankings. If you look at who’s been ranked high over the past ten years and see where they panned out, that question can be easily answered.

            WIN: What about rankings that rate a college’s recruiting class? Should we care about such rankings? Many years, your Iowa recruiting classes were not ranked that high.

            Gable: Those are important, too. But when you have rankings, they are not perfect, but they should give you an idea of what you are into or what you have. Does it mean that a ranking is the number one thing you go by? No. When I came to Iowa as an assistant coach, I didn’t even know what recruits were coming in. But as I evaluate them today,  they were pretty good. My belief is that if someone is running a good system within their practice facility and outside the program, I don’t think you have to worry about developing kids. It’s more than the athlete. It’s the system the athlete goes into.

            WIN: What makes a good system?

            Gable: Having coaches who are very knowledgeable and having people within the athletic department who can help them. The kids who came in that first year like Brad Smith had a really good opportunity to succeed and not because I was there … because I didn’t really know what coaching was then. Gary Kurdelmeier really knew where coaches need to be and what their duties should be within the system.

            WIN: Are you saying it’s not so much the recruit coaches bring in, but who is there to deal with wrestlers once they are in the wrestling room?

            Gable: I think that’s the most important thing, but it’s nice to have really good recruits. Until you have the kid visit or visit him at his home, you don’t really know for sure what you have. One of the most important times during the recruiting process was the 48-hour period he visited the campus and sat down in my office. I could usually feel good about this kid. He may have been on his fifth or first recruiting visit and if he came in with open eyes and ears and soaked up every word you said, then I felt good about the kid.

            I’m talking about the kid’s attitude. I also didn’t want to have to talk the kid into coming. I felt it was better if he really wanted to be there. If a kid still wanted to look at three or four more schools, I wasn’t sure that was the kid we wanted here. If it was down to us and one other school, I felt good that he would listen and fall in well in the system because if you don’t believe in the system, then it’s really difficult.

            It’s not so much who I go out and recruit. There is every once in the while where I have to really sell the program. Believe it or not, after winning nine straight championships, when we recruited the Brands, I had to get off my rear and go out. I felt that I had to do a better job than what the system could provide, which meant I could do more salesmanship.

            WIN: What was the key to being a good salesmen?

            Gable: Gary Kurdelmeier gave me a dose of being a good salesmen.  He taught me that you show them you are really interested in them more than anyone else.  There weren’t as many rules back in those days and I remember him telling me we are going to this place and check you into this hotel and I don’t want you leaving town until — even though you can’t see them — they make up their mind. When they make up their minds, it’s going to be hard to tell you they are going someplace else when you are in town. I did that with the Banachs (Lou and Ed, who later won NCAA titles for Iowa) when I became head coach. I think it helped knowing that I was right down the street. Of course, they changed the rules but it showed how much you need to put into recruiting sometimes.

            If you don’t have a good system, you have to do a better job of selling the program. When I came to Iowa, I never doubted the program. The system needs to have someone who is a great leader who can rub off on a lot of different people. The more who join that leader, the better chance you have of having good teams.

            WIN: What else is important in determining a good recruit?

            Gable: It’s important that you find someone who can lead the team. If you look at some of the suspect teams we had, look at who was leading the team in the room other than the coaches. Brent Metcalf is a good example of someone who is a good leader. The fact that after getting beat in the NCAAs, he went out to compete at the U.S. Nationals. Some years, there is not a guy out there. Sometimes a coach has to find someone else who is a good example.

            WIN: If a wrestler does not pan out, is that as much the problem with the recruiting process of the athlete?

            Gable: I would say it is the system. I don’t remember too many athletes not panning out. And besides, what does that mean? Not panning out.  I don’t measure recruiting classes when they come in, but when they go out. If they go out with the same credentials that they came in with, that’s not good. When they leave, you have to look at who they are when they leave. Even if they have not “panned out” on the wrestling mat, how did they pan out for the rest of their life? That’s another aspect of a good system. A good system will give everyone on the team a chance to walk away ready for whatever they are going to do.

            WIN: Do recruits want to be great wrestlers or great student-athletes?

            Gable: It’s tougher today to not put the emphasis on a student-athletes as compared to when I first started. They’ve always used the term, student-athlete, but today you have to back it up. There are so many things that have pushed that way on the academic end, that it’s difficult to just get an athlete.

            WIN: Because of the NCAA Academic Performance Rating (APR, which measures student eligibility and retention), is recruiting even more of a gamble than it used to be?

            Gable: The coach has to stay up on a lot more things than it used to be and that’s just one more thing that makes a good system.

            WIN: Out of 9.9 scholarships (the NCAA financial aide limit a Division I program can offer), how many wrestlers should a coach try to get out of that number?

            Gable: My ideal number would be 25, but that usually never happened. I usually ended up with 18 or 19. You end up having to give up a little more scholarship than you want.  The better your program is, the better chance of getting a kid for less. Then I think you need another ten kids after that; kids who are walk-ons.

            WIN: Do many kids warrant full-rides?

            Gable: Yes, but does that mean they are going to give some of it back. A good system would want to make that kid give some back but only if have you’ve made things good for the kid. After a couple years, a kid on a full ride would hopefully want to help out and give some of it back.

            WIN: When coaches recruit a young man, should they look for immediate results or for results down the road?

            Gable: I would not use that terminology. I look at if I’m getting out the potential of what I have. If I am, then I am going to have some pretty good results even though they may not be all wins. And those wins might come after the wrestler leaves here.

            WIN: A lot of kids have already been taught skills in clubs by those who have wrestled in college. Should coaches try to erase those skills or use them?

            Gable: You just add to them. What you have to do is break down the kid to the point where you know what he has to offer and what he is missing. Then add to what he is missing, especially in terms of basics. You want to take something that is natural but not basic, you don’t want to take that away from him. You want to get it in a priority system.

            WIN: Many recruits are great wrestles who have never had to worry about getting off the bottom. Is that something you have to look at during the recruiting process?

            Gable: That’s one more think you have to break down. Even for me, it was difficult because I wasn’t used to being there. You also teach them some rules of wrestling and what’s important. When you recruit someone, you hope they can take someone down and they can escape. You also help these kids in what they have so they can utilize it, as long as it works.

            WIN: Do you recruit technique or toughness in a college prospect?

            Gable: I’d rate it toughness, then technique. You can add to it based on what your program is. There are a lot of nice guys in the world. Not everyone has someone who has a button you can push that brings out his toughness. It would be great if everyone had it, but not everyone has it so you have to find it.

            WIN: Is there really a recruit who is a wrestling gem?

            Gable: I don’t think there is a gem any place who is automatic in our sport. Our sport gets evened out. We just saw it at the national tournament. There are too many unknowns to have an automatic.