Ex-Hawkeye Zadick calls it a career - kind of

IOWA CITY - Mike Zadick didn't leave his shoes on the mat, the symbolic way to announce a wrestling retirement.

He didn't even take the mat in his consolation bout at the Olympic Wrestling Trials on Saturday, defaulting because of a hamstring injury after a loss to Logan Stieber in the challenge tournament semifinals.

But this “likely” is it for the former University of Iowa standout and current Hawkeye assistant coach.

Making a big deal of a retirement, he said, isn't his thing.

“I won't say (retirement), but more than likely,” he said at a news conference at Carver-Hawkeye Arena, his “home” in wrestling for the past 12 years. “There's a lot of things I was able to do years back that I can't do. There's a lot of fighting, a lot of tug-of-war with my body.”

A 2008 Olympian who was an alternate in 2004, Zadick won his first match here Saturday in the 132-pound bracket, then lost, 1-2, 1-0, 1-0, to Stieber.

“It's tough, it's very disappointing.” he said of his performance. “My whole life has been for this moment. When you don't reach something, it's tough. It's tough to deal with for me.”

Zadick's career includes three All-American finishes at Iowa, the best a third in 2001, and a runner-up finish in the 2006 World Championships, as well as those aforementioned Olympic teams.

It wasn't enough, however. He said “Mike Zadick came up short” in college and internationally.

“That was the goal, that was always the goal,” he said of winning gold.

He acknowledged, however, there were many good times in his life as a wrestler, including the friends, teammates and coaches he's met - people he calls “family.”

“There's a lot of positives to take out of it,” he said. “It's all because of wrestling ... this has been my entire life.”

Wrestling will continue to be big part of that life.

“The work that has to be done here with the program, the coaching part of life,” he said of his next phase.