As Hawk fans, it has been both a great pleasure to watch Lee but gut-wrenching at the same time...all those times we wondered if Lee can't get the quick finish, can he hold on the last few minutes. If that got in our heads, how do you think it was for him? Holy ****...and oh yea SL, you are the one that has to carry the Iowa banner on your back and your body is probably going to fail you and give you 6 months of rehab (again) on top of it.
I'm guessing "The Brands breaks em" crowd would be really surprised to learn just how little SL actually wrestled live in his time at Iowa. For 99.9% of wrestlers out there, this would put an end to any hopes of NCAA or World titles. Other wrestlers adjusted to him; try not to get dominated early and hang on to score points later on. Throw the kitchen sink...that worked a couple of times, especilly when he was tired and straight legged. So SL and Iowa adjusted and tried to manage matches which worked very well but it was like watching Nolan Ryan trying to aim the ball instead of letting it fly.
So I think he made up his mind that he was going to go out there and let it fly. Just imagine how dominant this cat would have been had he "normal" knees and the ability to train hard in the room and just a "normal" gas tank. He just produces so many "Howdafuq" moments. One of my favorites was when the Iranian threw the "Jap-Wizard" (Gilman to Ironside!) on him and found out he scored no points...the look up to the ref and corner was priceless.
Anyways, I think I woke up the neighborhood. Very happy for him.
As a whole, USA wrestled lights out. Should have had 6 titles imo. Anything close wasn't going to go Hidlay's way. I was also very happy for RBY and glad he beat the NK in the semis.