Hlas: Wrestling truly is blood, sweat, tears

IOWA CITY — This is hard stuff, wrestling.

The story of this weekend's Big Ten Championships in Carver-Hawkeye Arena looks like it will be Penn State, the winner of four of the last five Big Ten and NCAA team titles.

So for a wrestling program that once claimed a long ownership of the sport nationally and in this conference, that's difficult for Iowa to accept. For now, the Hawkeyes have four men who will compete for a league title on Sunday and three others who will challenge for third place. As many as nine of the 10 members of their lineup could still end up qualified for next week's NCAA tournament.

The 10th man expended blood from a cut on an ear, sweat, and finally, tears.

With a humble season-record of just 4-5, Iowa's lone unseeded competitor in this tourney had to know he wasn't going to walk away with a conference championship. Or did he think exactly the opposite? He probably did.

Brody Grothus drew the top-seeded 141-pounder in the preliminary round, Micah Jordan of Ohio State, Saturday morning. Grothus pushed Jordan to the end before falling, 5-3, and dropped into the glamorless consolation round.

Grothus drew a bye in the first session of the consy, then returned to the arena Saturday night only to get pitted against the No. 2 seed, Tommy Thorn of Minnesota. Thorn had been upset by seventh-seed Danny Sabatello of Purdue in the quarterfinals.

So Grothus again fought for seven solid minutes, but was on the wrong side of a 7-5 decision to Thorn. And that was it. His tourney was done, he wouldn't advance to the NCAAs, his career was over.

While action continued inside the arena and four of his teammates won to proceed to this afternoon's finals, Grothus sat on a lobby floor just beyond the main arena. With his back against a pillar, he wept in sorrow.

His parents sat on the floor with him, saying little, but being there for him. You come into the Iowa program you grew up admiring from your Davenport hometown, you go through what wrestlers at this level endure for five years including a red-shirt freshman season, and you expect to do huge things before you're done.

No one says you could tear shoulder cartilage and have to find your way back from that.

'A lot of sacrifice,' Iowa Coach Tom Brands said about Grothus. 'A lot of doing things that aren't comfortable. Not a whole lot of complaint from him.'

Fifteen months earlier, Grothus was 14-2 as a junior when he suffered a torn labrum at the Midlands tournament. That was his last match of the season. He needed off-season shoulder surgery, and didn't return to competition until six weeks ago.

He wasn't quite good enough to beat either of the top two seeds at his weight Saturday, and didn't get a chance to battle some of the lesser talents at that weight. Seven Big Ten wrestlers at 141 will move on to New York's Madison Square Garden for the national tournament. Grothus won't be among them.

'I know he's hurting now and nobody's happy,' Brands said. 'But what that guy gave for five years ... We don't talk about moral victories, but there's a lot to be said for a moral victory there, and also how he carries himself.'

Hard stuff, wrestling.

Iowa 285-pound red-shirt freshman Sam Stoll was having a fine first collegiate season. He was 20-2 before he suffered a knee injury here on Feb. 23 during his match with North Carolina State's two-time NCAA champ, Nick Gwiazdowski.

Stoll had a big brace on his left leg Saturday. Yet, he wrestled four matches this day. He won twice. Sunday, he'll be in a match to determine seventh place at his weight. It isn't what he envisioned a few weeks ago.

On his way out of the main arena after losing to Nebraska's Collin Jensen in Saturday afternoon's quarterfinals, Stoll angrily kicked a garbage container. Presumably, with his good leg.

No one here is talking about the extent of his knee injury. Wrestlers get hurt. It's a given. Stoll came here to wrestle Saturday. He came here to win.

Four Hawkeyes can still capture Big Ten titles. How much does this mean to them, and every other wrestler in this tourney? Only everything.