Casey Cunningham was the guest speaker at this past Sunday’s social, and he candidly answered a variety of questions. Going off memory here which is sliding so please fill in any blanks.
Question 1, which I was late getting to hear, was about the debacle after the match at Maryland. Casey said he’s been called a lot of things in his coaching career but never a Mother F’r . Casey also told a funny story about after the Iowa match, that during the handshake line, Tom Brands said,” you really kicked our ass”!, and then said nothing else. Everyone thought that was pretty funny!
Next question was by me. I asked that since the BTN+ student home announcers sometimes have very little knowledge of wrestling, would it be possible to make a short video explaining scoring, pinning moves, etc for them? Everyone laughed, but he thought it was a good idea.
Question about starters for the match? Casey answered that it would be the first time all the starters were healthy since early season and all would be going today. He said the flu hit them pretty hard as it did other teams mentioning Missouri and how many guys were out for the ISU match.
Question about having a PSU women’s wrestling team? Casey answered that PSU is currently offering 31 sports to student athletes, and adding another will take some work. He stated that his daughter is 10 years old and wrestles, so he’s definitely in favor of it. Casey said the Iowa coaches sent his daughter an Iowa women’s wrestling shirt, and he threw it away. That brought a big roar from the crowd. Someone else asked who the women spar with and he said with each other and that the lighter guys in the room will work with them when they can.
Question about his most memorable matches as a PSU coach? Casey stated that Bo’s pin of MyMar at the 2018 championships stands out. He said DT’s Olympic Gold metal match rated right up there. He mentioned Zain’s World Gold metal and told a funny story about it. Casey was so happy for Zain and was fighting back tears when he hugged him after the match. He laughed and said Zain had this look that said ‘ get a hold of yourself Casey’. Someone mentioned Anthony Cassar and Casey said another great story.
That’s all I can think of for now, but if you were there and know any other good ones I missed please pile on. Also forgive the grammatical errors!