Dylan Wanagiel is no stranger to wrestling events. As the current Vice President of Sports Properties and Special Events for the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, Wanagiel is again bringing a major wrestling event to the tri-state area. Previously, Wanagiel was one of the driving forces into bringing the NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships to Madison Square Garden in New York City, the venue Wanagiel worked at prior to moving back across to the New Jersey side. Final X is also pairing...
Jun 12, 2025•20 min•Ep. 785
We’ll get a chance to talk with new Army West Point Head Coach Troy Nickerson on Episode 786 of the Short Time Wrestling Podcast. First up, host Jason Bryant discusses the Hall of Fame Honors Weekend 2025, highlighting the induction of Terry Davis and the 40th anniversary of "Vision Quest." He recounts his experiences in Stillwater, Oklahoma, including interactions with wrestling legends and the local community. Troy Nickerson, the new head wrestling coach at Army West Point, is introduced. Nick...
Jun 10, 2025•36 min•Ep. 786
Jason Bryant looks through the brackets and highlights wrestlers to watch from the 2025 NAIA Men’s Wrestling National Championships coming up March 6-8 in Park City, Kansas. Cheat Sheet Brackets: https://www.mattalkonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/highlight-2025NAIA.pdf Want an ad-free version of the show AND the best in wrestling news from around the world? Sign up for the Daily Wrestling Newsletter presented by Resilite on Substack at https://www.mattalkonline.com/news Links to Follow Joi...
Mar 04, 2025•30 min•Ep. 785
Jason Bryant hosts the Short Time Wrestling Podcast, featuring Dr. Bill Welker, a longtime wrestling coach, referee, and journalist. They discuss Welker's career, including his early wrestling days in Pennsylvania, his move to West Virginia, and his contributions to the sport. Welker shares insights on wrestling's evolution, particularly regarding dieting and the growth of girls' wrestling. He also talks about his writing, including wrestling novels and a memoir. They touch on the challenges of ...
Feb 21, 2025•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 784
Ron Lang, author of "Mat Return," discusses his book's focus on the transformative power of wrestling across the United States. He highlights the sport's resurgence, emphasizing its benefits in personal growth and athletic development. Lang, a former football and wrestling coach, shares his passion for wrestling, which he believes is the most transformative sport. He recounts his journey in starting wrestling programs in Texas and the challenges faced, including convincing football-dominated sta...
Feb 11, 2025•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 783
For the past 20-something years that I’ve covered the world of college wrestling, one system has always been extremely unique and interesting to me, the California Community College Athletic Association. Now branded as the 3C2A, the organization has sponsored a men’s wrestling collegiate championship since 1959. In 1982, the strangest thing about the league came into being - it became a fall sport. So for over 40 years, the first wrestling to kick off each season isn’t the NWCA All-Star Classic ...
Dec 19, 2024•49 min•Ep. 782
One of the dynamics of small college wrestling is finding mat time for your large rostered teams. At Augsburg University, the Auggies host the Auggie Invitational, which has multiple divisions to help larger programs get mat time and keep their starters and non-starters engaged in their respective programs. On Saturday, November 16, Jason Bryant of Mat Talk Online skipped over to Si Melby Hall on Augsburg’s campus to talk to a handful of coaches from around the region, country and Division II an...
Nov 19, 2024•47 min•Ep. 781
Back on May 8, 2009, the Wrestling 411 podcast with Kyle Klingman and Jason Bryant was running through its first (And only) season. A senior from Graham High School in Ohio named David Taylor would win the 2009 Dave Schultz High School Excellence Award from the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. Taylor had signed with Iowa State, but Cael Sanderson had a few week prior left Iowa State to take over at Penn State. At the time, Taylor didn’t yet know where he was publicly going to go, although most a...
Nov 05, 2024•34 min•Ep. 780
It’s Men’s Wrestling Media Day at the University of Iowa, so there’s a lot of stuff to take in here. Special thanks to the University of Iowa media relations for sending this along. Timestamps 0:10 - Greetings and Salutations - and some housekeeping Iowa Men’s Wrestling Media Day 3:30 - Head coach Tom Brands 22:00 - Jacori Teemer 24:00 - Nelson Brands 26:00 - Ben Kueter 31:15 - Mikey Caliendo 33:00 - Stephen Buchanan 34:00 - Ryder Block 36:10 - Drake Ayala 37:30 - Gabe Arnold Want an ad-free ver...
Nov 01, 2024•41 min•Ep. 759
It’s time for the annual KCAC women’s Wrestling Media Day, where the eight teams in the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference will give their previews of the upcoming women’s wrestling season as well as hear questions from the media and fans who were watching live via the conference’s Facebook page. Nate Naasz of the NWCA serves as your moderator for media day. Timestamps 0:10 - Greetings and Salutations - and some housekeeping KCAC Media Day 2:30 - Introduction 3:20 - IMA’s Josh Miller 5:00 - A...
Oct 23, 2024•34 min•Ep. 758
It’s time for the annual KCAC Men’s Wrestling Media Day, where the eight teams in the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference will give their previews of the upcoming men’s wrestling season as well as hear questions from the media and fans who were watching live via the conference’s Facebook page. Nate Naasz of the NWCA serves as your moderator for media day. Timestamps 0:00 - Housekeeping and news about the Daily Wrestling Newsletter KCAC Media Day 8:00 - IMA’s Josh Miller 10:00 - KCAC Commission...
Oct 22, 2024•54 min•Ep. 757
It’s App State wrestling media day and the Mountaineers talk about the upcoming season with head coach JohnMark Bentley and returning NCAA qualifiers Sean Carter, Will Miller and Tomas Brooker. Coach Bentley (7:00) talks about the schedule and who’s coming to Varsity Gym and touches briefly on the situation at Campbell, as the two schools have become fierce rivals on the wrestling mat. Carter discusses his return to the lineup and up at a new weight for his final year of eligibility (26:00). Mil...
Oct 18, 2024•51 min•Ep. 756
On Iowa women’s wrestling media day, Iowa women’s wrestling coach Clarissa Chun addressed the upcoming season. The team returns nine All-Americans, including four defending national champions, and welcomes seven freshmen and four transfers. Chun highlighted the benefits of training in the new state-of-the-art Goschke Center and emphasized the importance of continuous improvement, rather than focusing solely on outcomes. She praised transfer Kennedy Blades for her quick integration into the team ...
Oct 15, 2024•18 min•Ep. 755
Kramer Whitelaw works as a deckhand with McAllister Towing in the Baltimore Harbor. In March, Merchant Vessel Dali slammed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, causing it to collapse and close marine traffic in one of the busiest ports in the country. Whitelaw, a former wrestler at George Mason University and McDonogh School in Maryland and a current assistant high school wrestling coach, was part of the clean up crew and talks about the experience from a work perspective, from a perspective of be...
Jul 09, 2024•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 754
During Hall of Fame Honors Weekend in Stillwater, Oklahoma, we got a chance to get outside of central Stillwater for a bit and meet up with Dr. Brandon Mason. A four-time NCAA Division I qualifier and 2007 All-American at 174 pounds for Oklahoma State, Mason is now a radiologist at Stillwater Medical Center. Mason was also recently on a tour as the team doctor with USA Wrestling at the All-World qualifier in Istanbul. In this episode of Short Time, we break down Mason’s entry into wrestling comi...
Jul 02, 2024•57 min•Ep. 753
DeKalb High School wrestling coach J.D. Oliva has a lot of hobbies and interests. From teaching and coaching to film making and writing, Oliva’s written a number of independent books over the years. His newest takes his passion for professional wrestling (aka sports entertainment) and turns it into a thriller with the backdrop of Japanese pro wrestling and the Yakuza. Check out the book and perks on his kickstarter page here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jdoliva/gaijin-an-international-p...
Jun 27, 2024•1 hr 38 min•Ep. 752
Walking around taking to guests at the National Wrestling Hall of Fame’s Honors Weekend before the unveiling of the honorees on Friday night in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Guests interviewed were Lisa Little Smith, Hardell Moore, Teague Moore, Tom Keen, Sandy Stevens, Kyle Klingman and Rich Bender. Want an ad-free version of the show? Hit up the Patreon link at patreon.com/mattalkonline to contribute and get your own ad-free RSS feed for (most of) the shows on the Mat Talk Podcast Network. Links to Fo...
Jun 05, 2024•26 min•Ep. 751
Longtime USA Wrestling staffer Gary Abbott has probably interviewed more people going into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame than anyone since he started with the National Governing Body in 1988. Abbott sits down with Jason Bryant to talk about the specialness of the weekend, what it's like covering this event and the changes in coverage from the USA Wrestling perspective over the years with Honors Weekend. Want an ad-free version of the show? Hit up the Patreon link at patreon.com/mattalkonli...
Jun 01, 2024•28 min•Ep. 750
In niche sports journalism, collaboration, knowledge sharing, and storytelling are key to success. On the latest episode of the Short Time Wrestling Podcast, host Jason Bryant catches up with longtime wrestling friend and fellow scribe Maggie Hendricks, who currently covers a number of sports for Olympics.com. The Chicago native has previously covered college and Olympic sports, wrestling, MMA and a bevy of others at outlets like Yahoo, USA Today and Ballys Sports. She was in State College cover...
Apr 23, 2024•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 749
Jason Bryant is joined by Anthony and Gennaro Bonaventura from the D3 Nation Podcast to talk about the NCAA Division III Wrestling Championships coming up March 15-16 in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Check out The Guide, Mat Talk Online’s massive Division I Men’s Wrestling Championship Preview Guide with pre-orders now available at WrestlingPreviewGuide.com . Use the Discount Code “podcast” to save $10. You won’t be disappointed. Want an ad-free version of the show? Hit up the Patreon link at patreon.co...
Mar 13, 2024•1 hr 33 min•Ep. 748
Checking out what’s coming up at the 2024 NAIA Men’s Wrestling National Championships this weekend at Hartman Arena in Park City, Kansas. Host Jason Bryant will look at the draws, point out who to keep an eye on and provide some history of the championships. Event kicks off Feb. 29 and will be streamed live on Flowrestling. Brackets at Trackwrestling.com Check out The Guide, Mat Talk Online’s massive Division I Men’s Wrestling Championship Preview Guide with pre-orders now available at Wrestling...
Feb 28, 2024•35 min•Ep. 747
The new Executive Director of Beat the Streets Bay Area, John Lange, comes on Short Time to talk about his new role with the organization and his return to wrestling. An All-American at Penn State in 1998, Lange has the unique distinction of being the first wrestler in the full wrestleback era to have lost in the first round and come back to take third at the NCAA Division I championships. He spent time as an assistant coach at Hofstra and Eastern Michigan before assuming the role of interim hea...
Feb 27, 2024•1 hr 20 min•Ep. 746
Pennsylvania native Tanner McHugh was a two-time high school state placewinner who opted to go the Division III route for college. During his time at Baldwin Wallace University in Ohio, McHugh launched the True Tan Wrestling YouTube channel. Fast forward a couple of years and McHugh is now coaching in Division III at Ohio Wesleyan University, a school that's in just its sixth year of wrestling. McHugh got back to his True Tan brand recently and will be releasing a documentary on the 2018 NCAA Di...
Feb 22, 2024•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 745
Shannon Scovel covers NCAA Division I Men's wrestling for NCAA.com. Today on the Short Time Wrestling Podcast, we've got Scovel, an Assistant Professor of Sports Communications at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and is also a former collegiate swimmer at American University. Scovel's journalism background has stops overseas as a Fulbright Scholar, internships at Yahoo and Sports Illustrated and graduate work at the University of Maryland. Check out The Guide, Mat Talk Online’s massive D...
Feb 08, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 744
Little Rock wrestling is ranked in the NWCA Division I Men's Wrestling Coaches Poll for the first time in school history. At No. 25 this week, the ranking is the quickest for a start-up Division I men's wrestling program since the first publication of the poll in 1960. Host Jason Bryant is joined by Little Rock head wrestling coach Neil Erisman to talk about the team's record-setting season and the perspective his team has on its recent success. Links to Follow Join the Discord: https://www.matt...
Jan 24, 2024•47 min•Ep. 743
Twas a backyard brawl on Thursday night. I took in some high school wrestling as I watched Mounds View High School dispatch with Irondale … which are the two high schools in my school district. One is known as the sports school, the other is the band and robotics school. The sports school won 60-6. By the way, former Gopher Marty Morgan’s youngest son is a 215-pounder for Mounds View and he’s freaking HUGE. He’s headed to South Dakota State. I was spotted in the crowd by one Mounds View parent. ...
Dec 08, 2023•6 min
It’s Short Time Shots, a look at the day’s college wrestling scores and more, I’m your host, Hall of Fame wrestling writer and broadcaster Jason Bryant and I want to let you know, this is the scoreboard show of record. Speaking of scoreboards, did you know you can find all the D1 dual meet scores and links to their results at collegewrestlingscoreboard.com AND I’ve added another redirect to help you follow all the tournaments from every division at collegewrestlingtournaments.com . NO ONE ELSE D...
Dec 07, 2023•5 min
Las Vegas is on everyone’s mind who follows the world of Division I wrestling and that also means me. There’s a bunch of Vegas-related content in the newsletter today, so again, you can find out how to get that daily at the end of the show. I was on the mic Thursday here in the Twin Cities - more on that in a bit, this is Short Time Shots, a look at the day’s results in and around college wrestling. Right now, if you hear any banging around, it’s because I’m getting a new furnace installed this ...
Dec 01, 2023•4 min
The network dropped a couple of episodes for you to check out - the biggest was Episode 2 of the Etched in Stone series on Gray Simons called Seven. Shane Sparks fired out a show with Alex Marinelli on the Go Earn It Podcast, which has been a great addition to the network. Bob Bowlsby, inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame this summer as an Outstanding American, is returning to where his AD career started - Northern Iowa - as the Panthers named him the school’s interim AD on Wednesda...
Nov 30, 2023•5 min
Bob Bowlsby was re-introduced at Northern Iowa on Wednesday as the school’s interim Athletic Director. A recent inductee into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as an Outstanding American, Bowlsby recently retired as the commissioner of the Big 12 Conference. Bowlsby’s first job as an AD came at UNI where he’d worked with the department previous to his promotion to the role. He then left to take the reins at the University of Iowa before finishing the first run of his AD career at Stanford. Bow...
Nov 29, 2023•33 min•Ep. 742
