Ranking Cael Sanderson’s top 10 wins as Penn State Wrestling coach
By Chris Snyder
No. 2
March 19, 2011
Philadelphia, PA
NCAA Championships
Penn State 107.5
Cornell 93.5
Iowa 86.5
Any great legend will tell you their first championships is always the sweetest. I’ll bring back a question I previously asked but flip the details slightly … How many times since 1953 has Penn State won the NCAA Championship? Once. And it was in 1953. Follow up question, how many east coast teams have won a wrestling NCAA title since 1953? One. Penn State.
Cael Sanderson had just led his 2010-2011 team to the B1G Championship in Evanston and they had their sights set squarely on the NCAA’s in the home state city of Philadelphia.
Only three Nittany Lion wrestlers found themselves in the finals in 2011. Frank Molinaro 149, No. 3 David Taylor 157 and No. 9 Quentin Wright 184. I say “only” because it’s hard to image a Penn State team with less than four in the finals due to what Cael Sanderson has done here.
In the end, only Wright was able to win his match. A hard fought 5-2 decision over No. 2 Robert Hamlin. Molinaro lost in a decision and Taylor was pinned. Just typing the words “Taylor”, “lost”, and “pinned” close to each other is weird.
When all of the matches of the 2011 were finished, Penn State still came out on top beating Cornell by 14 points. This was another signal to the wrestling world to watch out for Penn State in the future. They will go as far as Cael Sanderson wants to take them.