No. 5: Former NCAA champ Pucillo, high school wrestlers reveal they're gay
Months before the Supreme Court ruled on same-sex marriage, three amateur wrestlers came out in the media as gay. Just after the conclusion of the college wrestling season, Mike Pucillo, 2008 NCAA 184-pound champ for Ohio State, revealed his sexual orientation in an exclusive interview with wrestling journalist Jason Bryant. In subsequent weeks, two high school seniors -- Cole Fox of Iowa, and Alec Donovan of New Jersey -- also went public. Fox, who wrestled at Don Bosco near Waterloo, will be attending University of Northern Iowa this fall, but has not said publicly whether he will join the Panthers. Donovan, a 2015 state champ for Brick Memorial High, has signed a letter of intent to wrestle at Cal Poly.
No. 4: Mock fired; one last year for Minkel
Just when it seemed the annual game of musical chairs for college wrestling coaches seemed to be much tamer this offseason than last, two bombshells were dropped. First, University of North Carolina announced the firing of C.D. Mock, 1982 NCAA champ for the school who had been head coach of the Tarheels for a dozen years, with allegations from the coach that his dismissal was more about his blog comments instead of his squad's on-the-mat performance. Then Michigan State announced a "coaching succession plan for wrestling" with head coach Tom Minkel slated to retire at the end of the 2015-16 season -- his 25th at the helm -- with long-time head coach Roger Chandler taking over.
No. 3: New college programs launched, some existing ones axed ... and a couple killed, then resurrected.
In the first six months of 2015, there was good news and bad news regarding college wrestling programs. North Carolina's Greensboro College and Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia are both establishing new wrestling programs ... Oklahoma's Bacone and Ferrum in Virginia added women's programs to existing men's programs, Millikin University in Illinois is bringing back wrestling after a half-decade absence ... and Fresno State made it official: the Bulldogs will be back on the mat in 2018-19 after the program was axed in 2007. Two other programs -- Cleveland State, and Northern State -- which had been slated for elimination were quickly granted a reprieve by school administrators, in large part to uproar, then generous financial support, from the wrestling community. Other programs given the axe in 2015 -- Georgia's Darton State, Arizona's Glendale Community College, Yeshiva University in New York City, Illinois' Knox College, both NCAA Division III programs -- have yet to receive a second chance as of this writing.
No. 2: Fab freshmen Martinez, Tomasello, Snyder
Three collegiate freshmen stand out in this writer's mind as having stellar seasons in 2015. Illinois' Isaiah Martinez capped off a perfect season as a freshman -- the first first-year collegian to do so since Cael Sanderson for Iowa State in 1999 -- by winning the 157-pound crown at the 2015 Big Ten and NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships ... then being named InterMat Freshman of the Year in a unanimous vote of the website's staff. Ohio State's Nathan Tomasello made a splash by winning the 125-pound title at both the 2015 Big Ten and NCAA championships. His true freshman teammate, Kyle Snyder, made it to the finals of the conference and national championships ... but really made a name for himself in more recent freestyle competition, shutting out his Cuban opponent at the "Salsa on the Square" event at New York City's Times Square in May, then defeating 2012 Olympic gold medalist and former NCAA champ Jake Varner, first at the 2015 U.S. Open, then in the finals of the 2015 U.S. World Team Trials in June, to wrestle for the US at 97 kilos/213 pounds at the World Championships in Las Vegas in September.
No. 1: A historic year for Ohio State and Logan Stieber
Logan Stieber celebrates his fourth NCAA title with his parents (Photo/Tony Rotundo, WrestlersAreWarriors.com)
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