Did Wyatt Hendrickson Ever Consider Football, Actually Been There, Done That

STILLWATER – We are talking about a good ole All-American man here in Oklahoma State’s No. 2 seeded heavyweight at the NCAA Wrestling Championships. Wyatt Hendrickson grew up knowing about Oklahoma State wrestling in Newton, Kan. However, Hendrickson at a young age was like most midwestern boys. Okay, some love basketball, but many were in love with football.

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Wyatt Hendrickson

“I did love football,” Hendrickson admitted. “It is actually the sport that I was going to pursue for my career. At the time I was 160 pounds as a freshman at Newton High School. I had a couple of  concussions in the past. Then I had an injury that kind of took me down for the season. I have a nice scar in here actually (pointing to hs leg below the knee), all the way to my knee actually. I was done. Both my parents are chiropractors and people that come into their office are hurt for the rest of their lives. They are 40-years old and they’re never going to move (well) because of football.

“I think having that leg injury, I was out for a little bit,” Hendrickson kind of restaged. “They saw all the people that were hurt. They didn’t see the people that were okay. They made the decision, along with me a little bit, no more football.”

No more football and Hendrickson wasn’t giving up sports, he just shifted gears and put all of his eggs into one basket or all of his effort into one sport.

“I started wrestling when I was five-years-old, but I never saw success until my sophomore year in high school,” Hendrickson said.

Arnold Schwarzenegger has a theory and Hendrickson, who I would consider a worldly man follows the theories of successful people. In the case of the bodybuilder turned actor turned Governor of California, he advised, even prescribed working on one goal, get that accomplished before you move on to what is next.

Bruce Waterfield/OSU Athletics

Wyatt Hendrickson winning the Big 12 in Tulsa.

“I had two focuses, wrestling and football, my freshman year I didn’t even qualify for state,” Hendrickson admitted. “Then my sophomore year it was all wrestling and I took second at state. I went from not qualifying to finishing second. I realized in that one-year how good I could get at wrestling if I focused on that and nothing else.” 

Now Hendrickson is a graduate of the Air Force Academy. He is a second lieutenant in the United State Air Force and a part of their World Class Athlete program. He will open the NCAA Wrestling Championships on Thursday against Matt Venadia of Michigan State. Hendrickson is the Big 12 Champion and is seeded No. 2 with a perfect 22-0 record. He is 122-11 in his collegiate career. I’d say he ended up focusing on the right sport.

Oklahoma State University Athletics

Steve Mocco

There won’t be a Steve Mocco-type act. Mocco won the NCAA Championship and came back to OSU for another year and played football. Hendrickson will be back at Oklahoma State, but it will be on the wrestling mat.

“If I would have started on just wrestling younger, I might have developed a little faster,” Hendrickson said, but I don’t think with any hard feelings.