By Mike Finn, W.I.N. Editor

J Jaggers said he was a little surprised that his Ohio State coach Tom Ryan wasn’t going to help him scout Hofstra’s Charles Griffin prior to their 141-pound semifinal meeting at the NCAA tournament.

            After all, Ryan had coached the Pride wrestler as Hofstra’s head coach before taking over the Ohio State program two years ago.

            “I actually joked with (Ryan), ‘Whose corner are you sitting in tonight?’ ” laughed Jaggers.

            Of course there was no question Ryan’s current loyalty, considering how quickly Ryan has turned the Buckeyes into a national contender in just two years.

            “Tom is going to go into the record books as one of the best coaches of all time, when you consider from where he has taken us,” said Jaggers, who was a freshman at Ohio State when the Buckeyes finished 45th in the country the year before Ryan took over.

            But Jaggers, the former Junior Hodge Trophy winner as the nation’s best prep in 2004 after he won his fourth Ohio state championship for St. Peter Chanel High School in Bedford, Ohio, was smart enough to know what he had to do to beat Griffin, the NCAA tournament’s No. 2 seed.

            “I’m smart too,” Jaggers said. “I knew he did a pass by to a single and he has a nasty tilt series on top, too.”

            With such knowledge, Jaggers, the No. 6 seed defeated the Pride All-American, 11-9, and advanced to the finals where he faced top-seed Chad Mendes of Cal Poly. Jaggers already had scouted the undefeated Mendes and knew all too well that the Mustang had an excellent “cement mixer” move in his arsenal by losing to Mendes, 9-8, during the season and by watching many of of Mendes’ matches on the internet.

            “I’ve seen Mendes use his cement mixer about ten times on Youtube,” said Jaggers, referring to the website where many videos can be found … especially for someone who thinks nothing more than wrestling during the season.

            “I’m a wrestling nerd,” Jaggers admitted. “I love wrestling. I have a social life also, but during the season I’m a nerd.”

            In the end, all that computer time … as well as Jaggers’ time in the Ohio State wrestling room paid off when he defeated Mendes, 5-2, in the 141-pound championship match.

            Not only did it  make him the tenth OSU wrestler to win a national championship — teammate Mike Pucillo increased that number to 11 at 184 pounds where he also won a title for the second-place Buckeyes — it also gave Jaggers some revenge against those who did not think highly about him, which may have led to a No. 6 seeding.

            “Not that I’m holding a grudge because of some ranking service, but I felt like if I lost a match, I’d drop down about seven spots while three guys ahead of me would stay the same,” said Jaggers. “I know what I can do and the guys in the room know what I can do. It’s the outsiders who don’t know. That’s why I have to show them in a tournament like this.”

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