Former Cowboy 133-pounder Coleman Scott won the National Championship in March, pinning his final opponent in 49 seconds. Former Cowboys competed for the U.S. Olympic team over the weekend. Scott finished fourth, but two other former OSU wrestlers, Daniel Cormier and Steve Mocco, made the team.
LAS VEGAS, Nev.— Former Oklahoma State wrestlers Daniel Cormier and Steve Mocco will represent the United States at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Both former Cowboys won their respective weight classes at the Olympic Trials in the Thomas and Mack Center on Sunday.
Cormier is set to compete in his second straight Olympic games after he won his best-of-three championship series over Damion Hahn.
Cormier claimed a 6-1, 6-0 victory over Hahn in the first match of the best-of-three finals series, then followed it up with a 1-0, 1-0 win over Hahn to punch his ticket to Beijing.
Cormier, the 2008 winner of the John Smith Award as the top American freestyle wrestler, won the bronze medal at the 2007 World Championship.
He placed fourth at the 2004 Athens Olympics and is now a five-time member of the United States freestyle world team.
He did not have to wrestle through the challenge tournament to get to the finals as a result of his past successes.
Mocco stormed through the challenge tournament with a first-round bye and followed it up with a 1-0, 1-0 victory against Les Sigman to set up his resounding 2-0, 7-0 semifinal win over Scott Steele.
Mocco beat previous nemesis Tommy Rowlands in the best two-of-three championship series to land a spot on the U.S. Olympic roster. Mocco lost to Rowlands at the U.S. Nationals in April.
By beating Rowlands on Sunday, Mocco made the U.S. World Team for the first time after posting runner-up finishes in 2005, 2006 and 2007. He was also the runner-up at the U.S. Nationals in 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2008.
In addition to the victorious Cormier and Mocco, two other former Cowboy wrestlers competed in the Olympic Trials finals, with Tyrone Lewis and Mo Lawal both falling short in their Olympic bids.
Lewis lost his best-of-three finals match to Ben Askren by dropping the first match, 2-0, 1-0 and the second match by a 2-6, 2-0, 1-0 score.
Lewis’ route to the finals started with a first-round bye followed by a 1-1, 1-0, 1-0 victory against Keith Gavin in the second round. Lewis beat Ryan Churella to put him into the final round, where Askren held him off.
A takedown with 17 seconds left in his championship match with Andy Hrovat ended up costing Lawal, who lost a 0-1, 1-0, 2-1 decision. Like Cormier, Lawal earned a spot in the championship series by virtue of his past performances. He did not wrestle in the challenge tournament.
Not including Cormier and Mocco in 2008, a total of 32 former Oklahoma State Cowboys have wrestled in 38 Olympic Games, and Cormier is set to join John Smith, Kendall Cross, Kenny Monday, Gene Davis, Harry Geris and Yojiro Uetake as former Cowboys to wrestle at more than one Olympic games.
Oklahoma State’s Coleman Scott and Jerrod Sanders both competed at the 2008 U.S.A. Wrestling Freestyle Olympic Trials on Saturday at the Thomas and Mack Center in Las Vegas, with Scott placing fourth and Sanders going 0-2 on the day.
Scott opened his day with a 3-0, 0-1, 4-2 win over Angel Cejudo in the first round. A 0-1, 1-0, 6-0 defeat at the hands of Mike Zadick in the second round bumped Scott into the wrestleback, where he handed Drew Headlee a 1-0, 3-0 setback to earn a spot in the third-place match.
Nate Gallick dashed Scott’s hopes of a third-place finish when he beat the Cowboy champion by a 2-1, 6-0 margin.
The U.S. did not qualify the 60 kg weight class for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, so competitors in this weight class (Scott included) were competing not for a spot on the Olympic team, but for the opportunity to gain full-time residence at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs and/or a stipend from U.S.A. Wrestling to train as a member of the U.S. World Team.
At 66 kg/145.5 pounds, former Cowboy Zack Esposito was scheduled to compete and was considered as a darkhorse candidate to win by some, but did not take the mat due to health reasons.
Also at 66 kg, Sanders lost his opening bout to Brent Metcalf by a 1-0, 1-2, 2-0 score before being eliminated in the wrestleback first round by Phillip Simpson; 3-1, 3-1.
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