 | Hot winter teams, with hockey still to play
3/20/2007 | | Happy wrestlers with their NCAA championship trophy. PHOTOS COURTESY OF GOPHER SPORTS |
Among the many successes this winter by Gopher “Olympic” sports teams (read: non-revenue), none was greater than the return to the top by the wrestling squad. Minnesota secured its third NCAA title of the decade (but the first since 2002) in a dramatic fashion.
After suffering several upsets on the second day of the three-day tournament, Minnesota won four of five matches in the medal round to pile up enough points to guarantee the team title before the heavyweight match. In that contest, undefeated Minnesota senior Cole Konrad pinned his top competitor less than two minutes into the match. Konrad finished the season 35-0 and won his second consecutive NCAA title. Other Gopher all-Americans were Jayson Ness, fifth place at 125 pounds; Dustin Schlatter, third place at 149; C.P. Schlatter, sixth at 157; and Roger Kish, third at 184.
“The true character of a team is when you  | | The swim champions celebrate |
get in a hole and you dig yourself out and do what you have to do to win,” coach J Robinson said at the post-meet press conference. “They responded when they had to respond; that’s what champions do.”
Other title-winning winter squads included the men’s hockey team, which took the WCHA regular season and playoff title before heading into NCAA play as the top seed; the women’s indoor track and field squad, which won its first-ever Big Ten title, with Heather Dorniden going on to take third in the 800 meters at the NCAA meet; and the men’s swimming and diving team’s dramatic finish to earn their fifth conference title in the last seven years.
The Big Ten men’s swim meet came down to the final event, the 400 freestyle relay. Minnesota trailed Michigan by four points and needed a win to capture the meet. Unfortunately, the Gophers faced Northwestern, which boasted the Big Ten record holder in the 100 freestyle and two others who had finished first and second in the earlier 100 free  | | Three-time all-American Heather Dorniden, just a sophomore. |
final. A scintillating second leg by Tyler Schmidt, in a time that would have easily won the individual title earlier in the night, put Minnesota slightly ahead, and anchor Mike Woodson held on to win the event by .16 seconds. Michigan, edged by Penn State for fourth in the event, ended up six points back of the Gophers. “I think that took 10 years off my life,” coach Dennis Dale said later. Minnesota hosted the NCAA swim meet, where it took tenth overall, the program’s sixteenth consecutive top-15 finish. Junior David Plummer had the top individual finish, taking fifth in the 200 backstroke in school-record time.
Next up is the men's hockey team's first round NCAA tournament game Saturday in Denver. The UMAA and the athletics department are teaming up to hold pre-game pepfests. Click here for more information.
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