Athletes Try To Pin Down Iowa Coach Gable, Mastermind Of Wrestling Dynasty, Ponders Whether To Retire

What does Iowa wrestling coach Dan Gable do for an encore?

His Hawkeyes won their third straight NCAA championship, they had five individual champions and scored 170 points Saturday, breaking the previous record of 158 set by the 1986 team.

Now they have to wait and see if Gable, who is pondering retirement, will return for his 22nd season.

“I’m already getting a lot of pressure from people (that) this is the perfect way to end,” Gable said. “It is good. That’s why I said that this could be the year.”

Iowa took a slight lead in the tournament Thursday, then went on a roll - winning 24 of 26 matches, including 23 in a row - to pull away from top-ranked and favored Oklahoma State and the rest of the field.

By Friday night, Iowa had clinched its sixth championship in the past seven years.

Iowa has won 15 national championships under Gable, who had hip replacement surgery on Jan. 23.

“I was hoping to win it,” Gable said. “But to win it in this fashion is mindboggling. If anything, this makes my decision more difficult.”

Oklahoma State finished with 113-1/2 points, followed by Minnesota (71), Iowa State (70) and Lock Haven (54).

Iowa’s winners included 118-pounder Jessie Whitmer, Mark Ironside at 134, Lincoln McIlravy at 150, defending champion Joe Williams at 158 and Lee Fullhart at 190.

Mike Mena’s match at 126 was the Hawkeyes’ only loss in the finals.

The Hawkeyes understandably want Gable to return.

McIlravy, who beat defending champion Chris Bono of Iowa State 5-3 in overtime and was chosen the tourney’s most outstanding wrestler, said he wouldn’t have won if it weren’t for Gable.

“I was extremely tired. But we wrestle that way in (practice). Gable prepares us for that,” said McIlravy, who won the 1993 title at 142 and the 150 title in 1994. “He’s pushed us to the edge … Somehow he squeezes it out of you.”

Whitmer downed Illinois’ Lindsey Durlacher 5-4, Ironside beat Oklahoma State’s Steven Schmidt 10-4, Williams defeated Edinboro’s Tony Robie 5-3, and Fullhart downed John Kading of Oklahoma 4-3 in a tiebreaker.

Oklahoma State had two champions in Eric Guerrero, who beat Mena 3-2 in overtime, and Mark Branch at 167.

Other winners were Lock Haven’s Cary Kolat at 142, Iowa State’s Barry Weldon at 177 and heavyweight Kerry McCoy of Penn State.

McCoy, the 1994 champion, has won 131 of his last 132 bouts.