In November of last year, I sat down with Dan Gable for almost an hour. 

I asked him about the hype for the 2020 half of the season, about Tom Brands as a wrestler and as a coach, and about the national status of the Iowa program. 

One of my final questions was about the best piece of advice he had ever given Brands, whether on or off the mat.

“Well, for his wrestling it was to cut the corner, and that means finish the single leg instead of muscling through a single leg, technically cutting through and finishing a single leg,” Gable answered. “I think that was probably the best piece of advice, but it wasn’t just giving him that advice. It was showing him the advice, too, and then him working on it hard enough to prove that he could actually execute this skill that was holding him back a little bit.”

He went on to tell a story about Brands, and how he would always stay a half-hour after practice. When Brands started staying only 15 minutes after practice, Gable pulled him aside and gave him some off-the-mat wisdom. 

“He was kind of, maybe, cutting a corner,” Gable said. “Even though he should cut the corner on a single, you can’t cut a corner on how much work you put in.”

The best person out on the mat is the one that works the hardest.

Iowa was the team that collectively worked the hardest this season. Since day one, this was tagged as “The Year” for Iowa wrestling. Major point-scorer Michael Kemerer was back in the lineup, The Bull had a chip on his shoulder, and Spencer Lee was even better than he was when he won either of his first two NCAA titles. 

After just one year engrossed in the program and college wrestling as a whole, even I understood what that meant. Iowa hadn’t won a national championship since 2010, and the Hawkeyes finally had the tools to compete step-by-step with the powerhouse of Penn State. 

Going through the season, I couldn’t fathom the dominance that Iowa had over anyone and everyone. It didn’t matter if it was a top-10 team, the pedal was to the floor and it never let up for the Hawkeyes.

Against Wisconsin, the score was 32-3. Indiana and Purdue, a combined 82-0. Nebraska, 26-6. Ohio State put up slightly more of a fight, but Iowa still won 24-10. Minnesota and Oklahoma State were both beaten by almost 30 team points. 

Even in a 19-17 win against Penn State, the strength was hard to ignore. The deafening noise of the Carver-Hawkeye Arena crowd as Kemerer upset No. 1 Mark Hall is something I’ll never forget. 

Hear Kemerer talk about his win over Hall in Carver-Hawkeye:

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The Hawkeyes crowned three Big Ten individual champions and won their first team conference title since 2010, mere days before the building anticipation for what would come next came crashing down. 

This season was special, and now it’s over. 

Over the past two years, Iowa wrestling has taught me to never shy away from a challenge. I’ve learned to trust in myself, to stand my ground and to always, ALWAYS, work hard. Most importantly, however, it’s given me a home. 

I used to hate wrestling. I didn’t understand it, I didn’t care to learn, and I couldn’t comprehend why it meant so much to so many people. When given the opportunity to cover Iowa wrestling for the 2017-18 season – Lee’s freshman year – I turned it down. 

But the next year came around, and for the first time in my life I stopped fighting the sport. I wasn’t going to grow and improve by running away from a challenge, by switching weights to avoid forces like Lee. 

In no way was I prepared for the world I was about to enter. It hit me on media day in 2018, with a question about the newly minted Hawkeye Austin DeSanto and the aggression he put on the mat. 

“You guys want to put a tag on him,” said Tom Brands, who I had met for the first time not even five days earlier, shooting back at not only the reporter who dared ask that question, but all of us. “I’m not putting a tag on him.”

Brands wasn’t done, and he never is. That was a lesson it didn’t take me long to learn. 

“[DeSanto is] not someone where the tag that you put on him is necessarily what's accurate,” he said. “Are you going to take my word for it or are you going to take these people out in Timbuktu's word for it? Take my word for it.”

Brands caught me off guard, and I was instantly intimidated. That guy is for real, and he’s not afraid to tell you exactly how he feels about what you’re asking. Note taken, coach. 

I didn’t realize it until the thing we all look forward to the most was taken away so instantaneously, but the wrestling world welcomes you with open arms, no matter where you came from.

As I stood on one of the mats in the wrestling room of Carver-Hawkeye Arena, fully overwhelmed on that first media day, Brands tapped me on the shoulder. The head Iowa wrestling coach who I had met for the first time earlier that week wanted to make sure that everyone was treating me all right. 

I had thrown myself into the fire during that 2018-19 season, but in the best possible way. There was a learning curve, for sure, but learning from the Iowa program showed me more than I think anywhere else could have. 

They work hard, they take pride in what they do on and off the mat, and they do their best to be accountable. 

I followed Iowa to NCAAs last year. I saw Lee win his second straight NCAA title. I got to write a pretty cool feature story on his journey to get there. It was the most exhausting and exhilarating three days of my life, and I would do it over again in a heartbeat. 

Iowa came up short in those three days, but it was poised to win it all this year. And now Lee and co. don’t even have the chance. It’s heartbreaking after what we’ve all seen this year, how the Hawkeyes have done what only very special teams have been able to do.

But what I’ve learned these past two years that sticks with me now is that they won’t give up.

Kemerer was literally on crutches with a shoulder brace at one point last year, and he came back to tech fall his first opponent of this season, 20-0, and be named the No. 2 seed for NCAAs. 

Lee was pinned for the first time since he was a kid in the final regular-season dual meet of 2019 and came back to win the NCAA title. 

The Bull lost to Vincenzo Joseph this season, but turned around and beat him for the Big Ten title this year.

Whether they’re all given an extra year of eligibility or not, the Hawkeyes are not going down without a fight in 2021. If anything, they’ve all got a chip on their shoulders, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. 

This opportunity was stolen from them, sure. But that doesn’t mean any of them will be quitting anytime soon. 

There’s no way in hell any of us should quit on them, either. Giving up feels like not cutting the corner on a single leg, and that’s just not what this family does.

Anna attended the University of Iowa, where she covered multiple sports from volleyball to football to wrestling. She went to Pittsburgh in March 2019 for the NCAA DI Wrestling Championships and did live coverage of the entire event and Spencer Lee’s second-straight NCAA title. Follow her on Twitter.