October 21, 2003
By Le Ann Finger
The NCAA has announced that the 2005 NCAA Division III Wrestling Championship will be on the campus of St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn. The competition will be held in the St. Olaf Tostrud Center Fieldhouse, with the connecting Skoglund Fieldhouse as the site with workout and warmup mats throughout the championship.
The Tostrud Center has already hosted the 2003 MIAC Indoor Track and Field Championship and the 2002 NCAA Division III Men's and Women's Cross Country Championship. It is slated to be the site of the 2006 NCAA Division III Indoor Track and Field Championship as well.
St. Olaf special assistant to the president and director of facilities (and assistant wrestling coach) Pete Sandberg, and former athletic director Dr. Cindy Book prepared the proposal to the NCAA. Sandberg said, "We are excited about all of this, but especially being able to help showcase the great Division III wrestling in the upper midwest. Minnesota wrestling fans will really enjoy getting to see wrestling powerhouse, Augsburg College, as they always hit their peak for this meet. St. Olaf, Saint John's, and Concordia all have quality athletes who will be in the hunt for qualifying spots in 2005. With the addition of the Wisconsin and Iowa Conferences, it should be a great couple of days of wrestling."
Book commented, "The Tostrud family had a vision to support physical education, recreation, and athletics at St. Olaf. This facility is one of the top state-of-the-art facilities in the country, which ends up being a great site for events like this. We are pleased to showcase our facility for the is national wrestling championship."
St. Olaf finished sixth out of the sixteen teams in the NCAA regional last year. They were led by first year wrestlers Jason Moore (FY, Brooklyn Center, Minn.) who was the champion at 165, Skipp Sandberg (FY, Northfield, Minn.) who placed sixth at 174, Ryan Jacobson (FY, Northfield, Minn.) who finished fifth at 133, Tony Rezac (FY, Northfield, Minn.) who finished fifth at 141. The Oles were paced by two-time national qualifier and NCAA postgraduate scholarship recipient Alex Morf (Sr., Mount Vernon, Iowa) who finished fifth at 149.
Concordia-Wisconsin (Mequon, Wis.) is the site of the Great Lakes Regional on February 28, 2004.