Fresh off a successful Big Ten Tournament where seven from his team outright qualified for the NCAA Tournament, Rutgers wrestling head coach Scott Goodale has the task to center and focus his squad on a bigger task ahead.
With the NCAA Wrestling Championships kicking off this week, Rutgers has the legitimate chance to place several wrestlers as All-Americans. But the attention will be the brightest on Dylan Shawver.
Shawver is the fourth-seed at 133 pounds and is fresh off taking the title at the Big Ten Tournament. He is one of eight wrestlers from Rutgers who qualified for the NCAA championships but his situation heading into this week is unique.
As a conference champion, Shawver must now his turn his focus back to once again competing. As the Big Ten Tournament champion at 133 pounds, he enters the NCAA championships with a target on his back.
“The biggest thing for me from a staff standpoint is getting off that high,” Rutgers head coach Scott Goodale said on a conference call this week.
“It’s one of the harder things we have to deal with is getting off the highs with the Big Ten Tournament and getting right back in the mindset of ‘Let’s get ready for the national tournament’ because the Big Ten is over .Of course, it’s great when there’s momentum when you’ve wrestled well, and you’re training well,
“He’s (Shawver) done that – he’s really, really trained well. I really think he wants the tournament….he believes he can win this tournament. So that’s that’s our job and that’s really, really important.
“But at the end of the day, it all starts over around. 11 o’clock Thursday morning. He’s got a very difficult match. So that’s the way we got to move on and that’s the way to approach it. And he’s super confident but you got to get off of what happened two weeks ago and really lock in on to what’s about to take place. These next – I shouldn’t say these next three days but the three days Thursday, Friday, Saturday – nothing can happen unless you get the first one.”
Shawver is 22-5 on the season and looks very comfortable at 133 pounds. He will start the NCAA Wrestling Championships against No. 29 Jace Koelzer (Oklahoma).