I wrote this today in anticipation of the midlands final, but spencer lee had to lose.............
Still thought it was worth posting. Enjoy.
Loyal to what cause?
College wrestling is, more than ever, a battlefield. Wrestlers enter the spotlight at increasingly young ages with those who excel becoming objects of obsession for many fans. It’s a joy to plot out your team’s optimal lineup, trying to figure out who slots in where to maximize their chances at a vaunted national team title. The bigger programs attract the best kids as the coaches put in legwork. Expectations run high for years before a wrestler even touches the mats. We knew who Mark hall was long before he donned the Penn State singlet. We wanted to be the ones in his corner as he followed in Cael’s footsteps, his hand raised as an undefeated four time national champion.
But battlefields are cutthroat and the rules of engagement aren’t always clear. Penn State has dominated the scene for years now and it’s rare that they don’t come up in recruiting rumors. When Nico Megaludis walked off the mat for the final time as a national champion, the first question on everyone’s lips was “who’s next?”
Penn State’s standards are so high, or at least those of its fans, that there were only a few names even in contention. Daton Fix was always going to go to Oklahoma State, but that didn’t stop posters from salivating at the thought of him with a white waistband. Nick Piccininni was at least from the east coast and had a respectable resume, but he didn’t quite fit the bill. Neither did someone like Tyler LaMont. For Penn State, there was only ever two options. Nick Suriano or Spencer Lee.
It never seemed to be much of a debate in Cael Sanderson’s mind. He camped out Nick’s house and rang the doorbell the moment the NCAA lifted the gates. He made an impassioned case to lure the soon to be undefeated four time state champ across the Delaware and it was obvious why. Nick lacked the freestyle pedigree of some of his peers, but it wasn’t a question of ability. He simply wasn’t committed to that discipline. When it came to folkstyle, Nick was a staunch wrestler who never gave an inch. He wasn’t about wasted movement or prolonged scrambles. He got in deep and finished shots with an efficiency rarely seen in an age where athletes have gotten so good at evading and defending aggression from neutral while worming their way into stalemate situations. A collective sigh went out when he signed on to become a Nittany Lion. Nick was not just excited to fill in as a true freshman, he was more than capable. It seemed that Penn State’s future at 125 was in good hands.
But what’s wrong with having your cake and eating it too? One didn’t have to look too far from Happy Valley to find another lightweight chasing his fourth state title. Spencer Lee was not just the best wrestler in Pennsylvania, he was a world champion who seemed to have no rivals in any country. He was an offensive dynamo who could score more ways than one could count. He could find and attack angles for quick takedowns as easily as he flips an unfavorable situation his way with a scramble. He was as close to the perfect wrestler as you could get at such a young age and, as a PA native, he should go to Penn State. It very well might have bordered on enlightenment, but fandoms rarely share realities with the athletes they follow. To us, it only made sense that he’d go to Penn State. In the end, he spurned us and chose Iowa.
Spencer Lee didn’t do anything wrong of course. He was simply making the decision that was best for him, but it was one which was bound to generate some animosity. And it did just that. Fans who had cheered for Spencer Lee during his high school years were far from forgiving when he lost to Austin DeSanto. His surgery was a major setback that furthered their doubt. There were a few who claimed he would never beat Suriano anyway. What if you told them that come December 2017, they would have been cheering for Spencer Lee in that very match?
Penn State had done nothing to earn Spencer Lee’s loyalty, but you couldn’t say the same for Nick Suriano. To say his move to Rutgers was a contentious one would be an understatement. Nick Suriano might as well have torn down Rec Hall, such was the impact of his departure. Many people forgot that him leaving Penn State was as respectable a decision as Spencer Lee’s choice of school. The university one attends is a major decision that can permeate through one's entire life be it academically or athletically. Both these young men were doing what they thought was best for their future's, not ours.
The way in which they did it was oh so different and it’s for that reason that Nick Suriano is looked at in such a poor light by Nittany Lion faithful. At one point he was meant to be Nico’s successor. At another, he was to be Spencer Lee’s teammate. Neither of those happened. He never even won a national championship in blue and white. It was as much of a betrayal as you can get in modern wrestling, one that could ultimately decide the national team race this year.
Nick Suriano and Spencer Lee are meeting for the first time at Midlands in a renewal of a rivalry which has not seen the light of days in years. They will wrestle backed by supporters from Rutgers and Iowa. Penn State will play no part. But for fans of Penn State who stood behind Suriano and Spencer Lee in the past, the rules of engagement have never been so unclear. The battle lines are muddied and loyalties have shifted so many times, it’s hard to know which side to stand on. When Nick Suriano chose Penn State, we thought we would always be cheering for him. When Spencer Lee chose Iowa we swore to always root against him. Now we’re forced to chose which horse is ours, when we don’t even have one in the race.
