Now why on earth would they want that? Diane asked. There was a time I wished it never happened, he says. When the 13-11 decision was announced in Owings favor, the crowd erupted in a standing ovation. He clings to it like a drowning man trying to stay afloat, because he understands what once had defeated him also made him a champion. Once there is a seed of doubt planted in your mind, well, youre probably doomed. Iowa State Coach Harold Nichols protested. The regular season winds downs on the final Sunday before conference tournaments. He was intrigued by Owings' swagger. But he was right. So I went up to 149, he says, and I told myself that hed beat me, and everybody will leave me alone. It was not a contest: Gable won 7-1. Smith, a man not quite 5 feet tall, ran over and bear-hugged and hoisted his champion. After beating up on them, he thought to himself, OK, I'm still good. I say that I went undefeated for seven years, lost a match, and then I got good, he says. One day his mother finally showed up at his door and when she saw Dan, she slapped him across the face, walked away, and made the one and a half hour drive back to Waterloo. This was where Owings wanted to be, on the mat in the middle of the action. In his senior season at Iowa State, Gable lost the only match of his amateur wrestling career to Larry Owingsa sophomore from the University of Washingtonin the NCAA 142-pound national championship. Instead, he thought of it as a reason to train with even more determination: "The more you can settle into focusing on what you have and what you would like to do and where you want to go a positive point of view the quicker things turn around and positive things start to happen. If there was one code Owings lived by then, it was a desire to have a second chance against anyone who had beaten him. I got bumped down a seed at Nationals in 72 because the winner of the regionals 1 weight above me dropped down for Nationals. Gable's career soared. Gable, who admitted he was uncharacteristically worn down as the match dragged on, remembered telling himself, "Don't get caught in the cradle. In 1966, he entered Iowa State, 110 miles away in Ames. Only one man who ever lived can say he beat Dan Gable, and that man is 1968 Canby Union High School grad Larry Owings. He grew up the youngest of five Owings brothers, all of them wrestlers; Larry, overweight growing up, was always the least likely of the Owings brothers to go one to become a great in the sport. He has softened in his old age -- thats what nine grandchildren will do to you -- and lately he has been more reflective; a stack of papers on the desk is the memoir hes working on with a writer. His physical makeup was legendary, his results extraordinary. ALEXANDER Stephen. "I'm not going out there," Jean said. Gable had an undefeated high school wrestling career. 1971 NCAA University Division Wrestling Championships; Tournament information; Sport: College wrestling: Location: Auburn, Alabama: Dates: March 25, 1971-March 27, 1971: Host(s) Auburn University: . Darrell Keller, Oklahoma State DEC Larry Owings, Washington, 16-12 150 lbs Stan Dziedzic, Slippery Rock DEC Jay Arneson, Oklahoma . The way Owings sees it, there was his life before the match and his life after: before 1970 he was a nobody hungry to make a name for himself in the sport, though also an introvert completely unequipped for the attention that would come. He won't allow it. [8], From 1976 to 1997, Gable was the head wrestling coach at the University of Iowa. In that stadium full of 9,000 screaming fans, the only one who thought Owings had a shot at taking down Gable might have been Owings himself (and, as he would later admit, probably his brother, and maybe his coach). Unbelievably, Mr. Flasche was my neighbor and customer at my pharmacy when he moved to our tiny, beautiful town of Troy, MT in the early 2000s. In his final meeting, he sat face to face with Karl Rove, who made the mistake of saying something to the effect of, Youll do what we tell you to do. Owings had one more thing Gable didn't have - implacability. An inspiring legend in his home state and as well as the country due to his work ethic and drive to succeed in wrestling, Gable won national titles in 1968 and 1969 at 130 and 137 pounds. Dan had a lot of pressure on him. He has come to peace with things he never thought he would. His voice cracks, his eyes flicker, and suddenly, he goes silent, grasping for words. "At that point, once I saw the score and only three seconds left, I knew he couldn't get two points," Owings said. Larry Owings Fall 6:12 Leandro Torres 4-3 Bruce Burnett 11-7 Paul Brodmerkel 6-2 Bob Bergen 15-6 Rob Brown 6-4 Larry Owings Fall 1:36 Leandro Torres 4-3 Bob Bergen 3-2 Larry Owings 17-2 Leandro Torres 4-1 Darrell Keller 16-12 142 Weight Class Larry Owings 5-2 Clay Jester, Massachusetts James Guizzotti, Ashland [7] Doug Moses, Iowa State Bye Stillwater, OK 74075 No, with his movie star looks and charisma, and a physique that would make Chris Hemsworth jealous, he was legitimately world famous. He also has a museum named for him in his hometown of Waterloo, Iowa, part of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame and Museum. Referee Pascal Perri described the noise as "comparable to Niagara Falls during the spring thaw.". Jean was due to wrestle in the night's final match, and the PA announcer called for the match wrestlers: Jean had three minutes to get to the mat. In fact, the result was so expected that Gable filmed a commercial with ABCs Wide World of Sports encouraging viewers to watch his final match by saying "Hi, Im Dan Gable. Dan Gable will tell you that eighty percent of wrestling matches are decided before the first whistle blows. It meant that when they met, it would be for the national title - Gable's final college match. He went on to finish 2nd as a junior and senior. By the end of the second period, Owings had stretched the lead to 7-2 and the crowd was hysterical. Im emotional about it because theres still a lot of meaning Gable told SI.com in 2014. After defeating Gable, Owings left the crowd at Northwestern stunned having witnessed wrestling history. But neither wrestler found the peace that they sought: Gable walked away wondering, How could I have lost to this guy?. Gable says that the loss was like a death in the family. It just about killed my parents, he says. (Refresh the page to see latest Notices) Monday February 27, 2023. That loss is a key part of the creation story for the Dan Gable myth. He has one VHS cassette of the broadcast but the tape is the only copy of the match hes ever owned, so worn that hes afraid that if he runs it in the VCR one more time the tape will be ruined forever. Was I annoyed? says Owings. Let us know if you can support our efforts to expand our operations and keep all of our content paywall-free. Both wrestlers advanced through the tournament by pinning each of their opponents. While wrestling still consumes Gables life, it now occupies such a small corner of Owings -- a retired school administrator, his life revolves around his wife and his 15-year-old daughter Sami, his work with his church and maintaining his properties in the small town of Aurora, Ore. -- that even some of those closest to him are unaware of his wrestling past. "I had never heard that before. Gable finished the scramble on top and ended the second period in the opposite manner of the first, this time holding the momentum and the power and the clock reset with two more minutes on the clock for the final period. At the 1972 Games, in particular, Gable won all six of his matches without giving up a point. There were some things I could have done We just thought you were invincible., Anderson was dying of cancer, and as Gable says, It was like he was unloading a lifelong burden., Where are They Now: Former UConn star Doron Sheffer. In "Larry Owings Documentary (The Man Who Beat Dan Gable," filmmaker Kaden Christiansen shares the story of Washington Athletics' Larry Owings, who is famously known for his upset of undefeated two-time NCAA champion Dan Gable of Iowa State Wrestling in the 1970 NCAA Wrestling finals. [7] After competing sporadically from 1974 to 1975, Gable retired and became a full-time coach. Thanks for the great article. But Dan Gable, of course, is so much more than one result. During the conversation, neither mentioned the match. Earlier in the day, without any prodding, he brought up the murder of his sister Diane in 1964. Owings will forever be in the history books because of this match, and the lesson from this moment is that anything can happen in the NCAA finals. He just smiled and congratulated me, never once mentioning he was an NCAA national champion! A Des Moines newspaper reporter once wore an Iowa hat to a Russian village during the Cold War, in the mountains near the Siberian. It was around the time I turned 50, and maybe that has something to do with it: I realized that I had a talent, and whats the point of denying that I had that talent? I assume how hard it could be to train when you're given a lot of essays and homework to do. Larry Owens (born January 8, 1983) is an American professional basketball player. Owings went to work on top, forcing Gable into a passive position and generating a stall call against the Cyclone for a point. How about a nod to the wrestler Owings so very wisely avoided. [10], Gable has been written about in many magazines and numerous books, including Two Guys Named Dan (1976), From Gotch to Gable: A History of Wrestling in Iowa (1981), The Toughest Men in Sports (1984) and Legends of the Mat (2006), all by wrestling historian Mike Chapman.[11]. After losing 20 pounds and growing several inches, nobody believed he couldn't be a wrestler anymore. With focus and determination Grant won 6-1in the match after Owings-Gable. He respected his pinning ability.". Yes, Dan Gable -- the most famous wrestler and most decorated coach in the history of the sport, the volcanic legend who was so combustible as a coach at Iowa that after losses hed return home and punch holes into his young daughters bedroom doors -- has admitted that he has become more emotional these last few years, someone who finds himself now tearing up at the end of old movies. But in ink? He won national titles at 130 and 137 pounds in 1968 and 1969. Its harder and harder now for Gable to feel the fire that was in him for so long, but he becomes alive again, the old wrestler with the mean streak, when he talks about the Owings match. His four brothers, his classmates, even his coaches at Canby High when he started wrestling told him he was fat. BURROWS Beverley. He also became the greatest coach in U.S. college wrestling, winning 17 NCAA titles, and 21 Big Ten Championships. During the weigh-in, an ABC reporter asked, Larry, why, particularly with such a successful sophomore season, would you drop a weight class that will be impossible to win because of Gables presence? Owings glared at the interviewer and said, Ill beat him.. Here's what you may have missed. More than any other sport, wrestling is rooted in self-belief and desire: being big, strong, fast and talented can take you only so far; in the end, it is about endurance, stamina, conviction. SECOND PERIOD: Gable chose top to start the second period with the goal of looking for a turn against Owings for back points, but, instead, Owings, escapes and takes a shot for another two-point . Later, in a quiet moment in his hotel room, Gable got his hands on the paper, and there, in big bold letters across the top of the paper was the headline IM HERE TO BEAT DAN GABLE. The Cyclone star did rack up his time in control and actively worked for the turn with an arm bar before resetting and continuing to ride. Leading 7-2, Owings continued to ride Gable before Gable notched a reversal and put himself back on track with a 7-4 score. When his teammates passed him in the tunnels they never expected a hello. Gable was heartbroken. The newspapersthough, focused on Gable's match:Iowa State star suffers mat loss, read the title in a story run by the Associated Press following the match. That Gable could lose. The night before the weigh in, he had a fight with his wife, who was seven months pregnant and didnt want him to leave her and the baby behind and go to the Olympics. During the award ceremonies, his real feelings came out. Email: info@nwhof.org, 303 Jefferson St. Larry Owings's wrestling career was different from Gable's. Growing up with 5 wrestling champs, Larry was told by his siblings he would never be a wrestler even being nicknamed "Porky." Owing wanted to prove them wrong. They made up songs about me and teased me unmercifully.. 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