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Sunday, October 1
Gardner only big star in wrestling
Associated Press
SYDNEY, Australia -- Rulon Gardner beat the unbeatable
wrestler and won America's least-expected gold medal in the Sydney
Olympics. He also saved the Games for the U.S. wrestlers.
If Gardner hadn't wrestled a nearly perfect nine minutes against
Alexander Karelin, who had never lost an international match, it
truly would have been an American meltdown on the mat.
As it was, Sydney was a huge disappointment for what
traditionally has been one of the United States' strongest Olympic
sports, one that had produced 44 gold medals and 99 medals in
freestyle.
Despite winning 12 consecutive matches over a two-day period and
qualifying six of its eight qualifiers into the quarterfinals, the
United States finished with a modest freestyle haul of two silver
medals and two bronzes.
"You can imagine how upset I am," co-coach Dan Gable said.
"We have to analyze this ... we don't want to end up like this
again."
The Greco-Roman team, never as productive as the freestylers,
almost topped them this time with a gold, a silver (Matt Lindland)
and a bronze (20-year-old Garrett Lowney in his first international
meet).
"I'm not interested in a silver medal," said 119-pounder
Sammie Henson, who got exactly that. "I came here for the gold."
Sorry, that was a no go -- or, more precisely, no gold, the first
time since 1968 the United States left an Olympics without a
freestyle gold. Since then, Americans had won 17 gold medals in six
Olympics, not counting the boycotted Moscow Games in 1980.
What went wrong with a team that was doing everything right
until Henson and Brandon Slay lost their gold-medal matches
Saturday?
Nothing -- and everything.
Physically, they seemed in excellent shape. Once they stepped on
the mat, they fell into bad habits -- overconfidence and an
unfamiliarity with international rules and tradition.
Charles Burton, for example, led his 187¼-pound quarterfinal
with seconds left, but then disobeyed instructions to keep his
hands off the upper body of Mogamed Ibragimov of Moldova. Ibragimov
immediately grabbed the hands, threw Burton for a 3-point move and
won 4-2, costing Burton any chance for a medal.
"We told him and told him not to touch the upper body," Gable
said. "He waited until 10 seconds left to go in the match and got
cocky. He stayed disciplined and stayed disciplined, but he broke
his discipline and got beat."
Burton said, "I could have sat back and done nothing. That's
not how I wrestle."
It also was one reason why he didn't wrestle for a gold medal.
Slay became upset when a couple of questionable calls went
against him in the 167½-pound finals, wasn't the same the rest of
the match, then complained about his opponent's "whining and
crying."
Terry Brands and Henson talked constantly about the dangers of
being sloppy and too aggressive early in matches, then went out and
immediately got way behind. Cary Kolat got lengthy instruction in
the new international clinch rule, then stubbornly gave away points
by giving up his grip whenever he got into a clinch.
"You just can't make a lot of mistakes at this level," Gable
said.
The Americans' off-mat behavior -- several slammed walls, Slay
didn't shake a referee's hand, Henson sobbed on the medals stand,
Brands whipped off his medal as soon as he got it -- didn't endear
them to the mostly Australian crowd, either. As a result, they
rarely had any crowd support and so lost what can be an asset
10,000 miles from home.
Kolat, the first American since 1980 not to win the gold medal
at 136¾ pounds, lost two rematches of protested victories in the
world finals the last three years. So, naturally, Iran successfully
protested a Kolat victory. Kolat, clearly unhappy at being forced
to wrestle again, fell behind big and lost, eliminating him from
the medal rounds.
"Cary Kolat, obviously, should have won," said Gable, one of
what essentially was four U.S. head coaches in an unwieldy system
designed to keep wrestlers working with their preferred coach.
Also, it probably didn't help that a 1999 world champion
(Stephen Neal) and a recent world champion (Les Gutches) were
eliminated in the U.S. trials.
"We're fair to our athletes, other countries aren't," Gable
said. "We've got to remember that. The system is good, we've got
to make it better.
"I read a story about the swimmers who got, what, 33 medals?
They had a team concept more than ever before, and maybe we have to
get some of that."
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