By Roger Moore

A week after the 2009 NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships, Virginia Tech athletics director Jim Weaver asked wresting coach Kevin Dresser to come to his office.

            In the walking-on-egg-shells, financial-crisis-culture of 2009, Dresser didn’t know what to think.

            “When the AD wants to see you in his office it makes you a little nervous,” said Dresser, a two-time All-American for Iowa in his wrestling days. “I thought maybe one of my kids was in trouble or something. A thousand things go through your head.

            “He threw some architectural plans on the table and said this is what you are getting and that I had to let him know of any changes I needed to make. It was a surprise but it showed the commitment to my staff, our athletes and our fans that we are serious about wrestling. Every year we take another step in the right direction.”

            Tech announced plans for a new wrestling facility set for the fall of 2010. The new area will include approximately 5,850 square feet of mat area and another 1,260 square feet of cardio area. There will also be a new locker room and coach’s offices.

            The Hokies, in the news more over the last few seasons due to the transfer issues of four wrestlers and former coach Tom Brands, finished 20-2 in dual meets in 2008-09. Seven NCAA qualifiers went a combined 10-14 but a young squad will only improve.

            Maryland, under first-year head coach Kerry McCoy, finished 10th in St. Louis with three All-Americans which all return this season.

            North Carolina State’s Darrion Caldwell was the NCAA champion at 149 pounds, while Duke heavyweight Konrad Dudziak lost in the finals. Dudziak was the Blue Devils’ first All-American and Caldwell was the Atlantic Coast Conference’s first NCAA champ since 1995.

            Virginia had seven NCAA qualifiers, one of the nation’s best recruiting classes and has its highest preseason ranking ever going into the 2009-10 campaign.

            Thirty ACC wrestlers competed in the 2009 NCAAs; 13 going 0-2 and 12 winning at least two matches. Those certainly are not Big Ten or Big 12 numbers.

            However, it’s a lot of good news for members of the ACC, a league that appears to be gaining some positive momentum as far as wrestling culture.

            “I think the culture is changing a little,” added Dresser. “On recruiting trips you hear Big 12 and Big 10 but I think it is becoming more and more evident that you can achieve your wrestling goals at a lot of schools.”

            North Carolina or North Carolina State won 31 of 32 ACC Tournaments from 1976 to 2007. UNC coach C.D. Mock, who enters his seventh season in Chapel Hill, was an NCAA champion for the Tar Heels in 1982.

            “I went from being the new guy to the old guy almost overnight,” Mock said. “I sensed a change in my third year. I knew we couldn’t rest on our laurels because of what was going on around us. My freshman year (the ACC) sent 10 to the NCAAs. We didn’t worry much about qualification back in those days because we dominated. It was either us or North Carolina State. It’s not like that now.

            “It wasn’t debatable that the system needed to be changed.”

The other coast

            The positive wrestling news isn’t flowing as freely on the other coast.

            At Cal State-Fullerton, site of the 2009 NWCA All-Star Classic, head coach Dan Hicks had to raise $60,000 to cover travel, uniforms, supplies and services to participate in 2009-10. The school would cover scholarships and salaries if the specified amount could be raised.

            Despite a successful drive to acquire the funds through camps and fundraising, Hicks was told he’d have to raise two years’ worth of operation budget to compete in 2010-11 which includes somewhere in the neighborhood of $394,000 by August 1, 2010, to cover scholarships, travel, salaries and supplies and services.

            Hicks’ wife, Jill, is in a similar situation as the women’s gymnastics coach. Her program must raise near $554,000 by the same date in order to hang around.

            If one doesn’t raise the funds, the other could still be dropped to keep Fullerton athletics in Title IX compliance.

            The University of Oregon announced it would cut wrestling in July of 2007. The Save Oregon Wrestling Foundation raised nearly $3 million in cash and pledges but after hearings, testimony and plenty of argument, the Duck program was lost.

            Portland State lost its program after the 2008-09 season, university officials citing poor performance in the classroom and on the mat.  In a statement released by PSU athletic director Tone Chisholm he said the academic failures were so severe they “could impact Portland State’s entire athletics program, including its Division I status.”

            The Vikings won Division II titles in 1967, 1989 and 1990, but since moving to Division I in 1996 PSU had struggled to win dual meets.

            Arizona State saved itself after momentarily going away in 2008. The Sun Devils are the last program besides Iowa, Oklahoma State, Minnesota or Iowa State to win a national championship, doing so in 1988 under Bobby Douglas.

            Oregon State has a solid history with a pair of runner-up finishes at the NCAA tournament and 18 top-10 showings. Hall of Fame coach Dale Thomas had 60 All-Americans during a 34-year tenure and Mark Johnson’s teams finished among the top 10 four times from 1994-98.

            The program’s resume includes two-time NCAA champ Les Gutches, also a World champ and 2009 inductee into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. Hicks was a two-time NCAA champ for the Beavers.

            However, OSU has finished 46th and tied for 41st at the last two NCAA meets.

            Carrying the torch of the West Coast is Boise State. The program only has two top 10 NCAA finishes in its history and finished 12th with three All-Americans in 2009. Ranked No. 9 in WIN preseason’s poll, BSU has won two straight conference titles and five of the last 10.

            “We’ve been able to take advantage of states like Washington, Montana and Utah, been able to get some talented recruits out of those areas,” said Randall, a three-time All-American at Iowa. “Boise is a great place to live. Wrestlers like to hunt and fish and we’ve really sold that.

            “It’s a tough situation for a lot of schools, especially those that aren’t fully-funded as far as scholarships. Right now it’s about looking out for yourself.”

            There’s been plenty of individual stars from the West standing at the top of the medal stand every March: UC-Davis’ Derek Moore (2007), Oregon’s Shane Webster and Boise State’s Ben Cherrington (2006), Stanford’s Matt Gentry (2005), Arizona State’s Eric Larkin (2003) and all-world heavyweight Stephen Neal, who won two titles for Bakersfield a decade ago.

            Arizona State, like Oregon State, has 18 top-10 finishes at the NCAAs. In 2009, after Boise State and Arizona State (T20), Wyoming (T32), a member of the Western Wrestling Conference, was the next-best finisher.

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