After sitting out the entire regular season, Dan deLalla returned to the mats with authority. After a one-minute sudden death overtime victory in the NECCAW finals, deLalla scored a takedown over the number-one seed Jake Tyler of Springfield. In his triumphant return to action, deLalla became Wesleyan’s first NCAA qualifier since 2001. In his march to the finals, deLalla knocked off the number two and three seeds en route to victory in the 157-pound weight class. Look for deLalla to continue his success on March 3 and 4 at the College of New Jersey, host of the Division III NCAA Championships.
MB: To start can you talk about the injury that took you out for the season?
DD: Well, over Thanksgiving break I needed surgery on my left elbow. After that I was in a cast for six weeks, and I didn’t get it off until January. All I could do while I had the cast on was the bike and stair-master, so I lost a lot of upper body muscle mass.
MB: After you got the cast off, what was your training regiment like?
DD: The biggest problem was straightening my arm out, and right now it’s still not even completely straight, but I decided to start pushing it about three weeks ago and I got back on the mat. There was plenty of pain and discomfort, but I worked through it and did a ton of push-ups. I just wanted to be back in time for the championships.
MB: Take us through the tournament and how your confidence level was going into it.
DD: Realistically, I knew where I was training-wise, but knew I could win it since the beginning of the season. Coach wanted me to red-shirt depending on my rehab schedule, but I wanted to wrestle. The first day I beat the second and third seeds so that put me in a good position. But the second day I had to wrestle Jake Tyler of Springfield.
MB: Was this your first meeting with him?
DD: No, last year he beat me in a close match 3-2 in the beginning of the season. This season he was ranked seventh or eighth in the nation though.
MB: Did he end up getting an at-large bid, maybe setting up a possible rematch at NCAAs?
DD: Actually, he didn’t. I was surprised. He is the alternate in the sixteen-man field at Nationals.
MB: So who are the top teams at Nationals?
DD: Like in Division I, the traditional powers are from the Midwest, like Wartburg and Augsburg.
MB: Where do you think you will be seeded?
DD: Probably right in the middle of the field, eighth or ninth.
MB: How many wrestlers earn All-America honors?
DD: The top eight, so I have a pretty good shot.
MB: Definitely. So how were the matches against Tyler this year?
DD: I just knew I had to wrestle smart and aggressively, and the first match I beat him 3-2. But he wrestled back in the loser’s bracket to force another match with me. He now had to beat me twice to win the title. Unfortunately in our second match of the day I made a careless mistake and he pinned me. But this match was close too. When he pinned me I was down 5-3, but could easily have come back and won by decision.
MB: So this is crazy, one final match to decide the champion? What was going through your head?
DD: Well, I knew I had to get back to basics. I knew and he knew that he couldn’t take me down, so he wrestled really defensively, using the edges of the mat to get out of bounds. This was a pretty good tactic but in overtime he was tired, and I secured a takedown for the win. In the end, I just wanted more than he did. I think I was just mentally tougher than he was.
MB: The home crowd must have been going crazy.
DD: Yeah, it was awesome, plus my mom was there to see me. It was the first time she had seen me wrestle in college, so winning was extra special.
MB: Any other thoughts on the tournament?
DD: I guess I was the only one who really knew that I could pull this off. But being a junior and having the experience definitely helped me. Physically, I was lacking, but mentally I had it all together. It’s going to be great at the College of New Jersey next weekend. I’ll have all the boys from the team there cheering me on, which will be awesome. If I wrestle smart and aggressively, like at New England, I will be an All-American.
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