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Bison standout accepts Penn State wrestling offer
Penn State University has one of the rising young stars in the collegiate wrestling coaching ranks, and perhaps the best college wrestler that has ever stepped on a mat, heading the Nittany Lions mat program.
One of the top wrestlers in McCook High School history hopes to absorb some of Cael Sanderson's wrestling knowledge and skills first-hand in the coming years.
Nate Morgan has signed a national letter of intent to join the Penn State wrestling team. Morgan, a McCook High School senior, signed the paperwork in a special ceremony Monday, May 3 at the McCook High School gymnasium.
Morgan's parents, Mike and Jill Morgan, witnessed the signing, along with Bison head wrestling coach Nick Umscheid.
Morgan capped a brilliant high school mat career last February when he won the Class B 119-pound championship at the state meet in Omaha. Nate ended his senior year at McCook with a perfect 35-0 match record.
The gold medal was Morgan's third piece of state meet hardware. He finished second at state as a 103-pound sophomore. In his junior year, Nate claimed a third-place medal at 112 pounds at state, as he suffered his only loss of the season in the state meet semifinals.
Why Penn State?
Morgan had contact with several NCAA Division I wrestling programs seeking his services for the next five years. Morgan probably put Penn State at the top of his college list after a visit last fall. It didn't hurt that Penn State also wanted him to join the Nittany Lions program -- and that Sanderson, an Olympic gold medalist is PSU's head coach.
"Basically they're the first ones that really started pulling on me, and the coaches," Morgan said, when asked why he chose Penn State. "Just visiting down there, and it feeling like the right place for me."
Sanderson was a standout collegiate wrestler at Iowa State University (1998-2002). The former Utah prep standout at Wasatch High School in Heber City won every match during his Iowa State career -- a remarkable 159-0 record, four NCAA and four Big 12 Conference titles, and a three-time winner of the Dan Hodge Trophy, recognizing the nation's top collegiate wrestler.
After graduating from Iowa State, Sanderson moved onto the international scene, and he won a gold medal at 84 kilograms (184.5 pounds) at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece.
When his former college coach, Bobby Douglas, stepped down as head coach at ISU, Sanderson was named as his replacement. In his first three seasons as a college head coach, Sanderson led the Cyclones to three straight Big 12 Conference titles and a second-place finish at the NCAA National Championships.
Sanderson took over the Penn State program for the 2009-10 season. The Nittany Lions finished ninth in the 2010 NCAA Championships.
Great opportunity
To say that Morgan is looking forward to working under Sanderson is a huge understatement.
"It's going to be awesome," Nate said. "It will just take my ability and performance to the next level. It will be awesome."
Coach Umscheid agrees.
"Cael Sanderson, his reputation speaks for itself -- not just as a wrestler, but also what he's been doing as a college coach for a few years at Iowa State, now at Penn State," Umscheid said. "He's known as a great recruiter, and we believe here that he's picked up another recruit, kind of a diamond in the rough, in Nate Morgan.
"I think what (Sanderson) really enjoys even more than Nate's athletic ability -- which is obvious with what he's accomplished the last few years -- is probably his character off the mat. Nate's a great person, he's easy to get along with, he's a very coachable young man, and he's got good family, and I think those things are just as important as what he can get done on the wrestling mat."
Redshirt likely next year
Morgan plans to major in kinesiology at Penn State, with a goal of possibly becoming an athletic trainer. He expects to redshirt his first college season, then have four years to home his skills with sights set on a spot on the Penn State starting lineup and perhaps a berth or two or more in the NCAA Championships.
"I need the experience and I need to improve a lot before I'm ready for that next level," Morgan said of next year's redshirt. "But it will be good.
"I'm planning on getting beat on every day in the practice room for the first long while. But I'll improve and get better and hopefully, come my senior year, I'll be the one back at the top."
The 18-year-old hopes to stay at 125 pounds in his college career. He hopes to be able to compete in open tournaments in his redshirt campaign next season to gain valuable experience.
"You get as many matches in open tournaments and stuff like that," he said. "You just won't be wrestling for Penn State and you won't be able to have a chance to go to the NCAAs."
Coach Umscheid said the Penn State coaches did not contact him about Morgan during the recruiting process.
"Nate kind of did the work himself," he said. "I told him that he was there if he needed the help, I'd call whoever he wanted me to. With all the camps and all the wrestling that he's done in the off-season, and during the in-season, he's made a lot of connections with some other college coaches. I think it was through a connection that he had through one of the summer camps that he goes to, that guy knew Coach Sanderson, and he put a word in for Nate, and just took it from there.
"Nate went out for a visit this last fall, and met the coaches, and met Cael and took a tour of the facilities. He came back and he really liked it. You could tell had he had his mind set that that's where he wanted to go. He was just waiting for them to offer that opportunity. So we're real excited that he's getting that chance.
"He knows it's going to be a lot of hard work. That he's just another body in the room now, and everybody that comes in there has great credentials. But we talked about he and he just needs to go in there and earn everything that he can get, and whatever he gets, savor it and just build off that, and before he knows it he'll be able to hang with anybody in their practice room."
Coach Umscheid said that to his knowledge, Morgan is the first NCAA Division I wrestling recruit in McCook High School history.
"Actually there's not that many Division I wrestlers that come out of the state of Nebraska," the Bison head coach said. "I could probably count on one hand the guys that are going to wrestle at the Division I level next year. That just tells you how special of an athlete Nate is."
Long distance
Mom and dad joked Monday about the long distance from McCook to PSU. The Penn State campus is located at State College in central Pennsylvania, about 1,300 miles east of McCook. Mike Morgan smiled when he said that he and Jill probably wouldn't be mat-side for all of Nate's college matches in the future, like they were for his Bison matches the past four years.
With all the camps and competitions Nate has been involved with over the years, he said he is used to the travel. But being so far away from home for an extending time will be something new, and exciting.
"I'm used to traveling, but not for this long amount of time," he said. "It will be OK, it will be good. It will be rough at first, but I'll get used to it and it will be OK."
Leaving in June
Morgan will get an early start to his college experience. He plans to leave for Penn State in late June to spend six weeks in summer workouts with his new teammates and coaches and to take two college classes. He plans to return to McCook in August before he returns to PSU for the start of fall classes in September.
Nate is ready to take his wrestling experience to the next level, and he knows what to expect.
"I'm going to have to bust my butt every day in the practice room, give it all I got, and I'll have to walk out on my knees by the time practice is over," he said. "Just look for improvement every day, soak up everything I can get from those coaches.
"It's a full-time job."
Time to go to work.
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