NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS/OLYMPIC TRIALS
Cox reaches top of podium at both the NCAAs and Olympic Team Trials
by Richard Immel
What a one-month stretch it has been for 21-year-old J’den Cox!! On March 19 Cox won his second
NCAA championship at the University of Missouri. Fast forward to April 10, Cox won the U.S. Olympic Team Trials. Two weeks later he won his first international tournament to secure a berth in the Olympic Games.
While he has never questioned his wrestling ability, no one is more surprised about this magical run than Cox himself. “We have talked about this my whole life but I never really dreamed of anything like this. It was a dream but never for real because I didn’t take the steps to do so. I was focused on folkstyle. Now to come out wrestle these great wrestlers, it’s great. I am grateful to come out on top,” said Cox.
Rewind to those last few months of his college season and people were ques- tioning Cox in every area. He was being undersold as a wrestler, but also as an individual.
In early December, Cox faced off against MAC rival Phil Wellington of Ohio in a dual meet between the two schools. After running Wellington off the mat from the top position and colliding with the hardwood floor, Cox was disqualified from the match with Wellington unable to con- tinue.
Since that match, Cox was bombarded with backlash and personal attacks from fans accusing him of being a thug, being enabled, being a dirty wrestler and other hateful comments. This is a tough set of circumstances for anyone to encounter, let alone a 20-year-old, at the time, col- lege student. Naturally, Cox used these circumstances as even more motivation. “I’ve taken a lot of backlash for it. People say they don’t want their children to look up to me. I’ve got to live my life. I’m going to live my life well and keep on wrestling because that’s what I love to do. I’ve really taken that as motivation. I’m blessed to do this so I’m not going to let people try and deter me and put me out of place, out of the right mindset to do this,” said Cox.
Following that match, Cox ran the gauntlet to capture his third MAC champi-
24 USA Wrestler
J’Den Cox scores on Kyle Dake in the finals of the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in Iowa City, Iowa. John Sachs photo.
onship and second NCAA title. He edged undefeated Morgan McIntosh 4-2 in the NCAA finals avenging a loss to the Penn State senior from the prior NCAA Championships.
Cox now owns finishes of first, fifth and first at the vaunted NCAA Championships and is on pace to go down as one of the best wrestlers in not only Missouri history, but also NCAA history. The journey to NCAA title number two was not without its internal challenges. Cox revamped his life philosophy after a disappointing sophomore year, by his standards. He changed the way he trained. He took his diet more seriously. But perhaps most importantly he began to believe in himself once more. “You have to believe in yourself and believe what you’re doing is right. When you step out there you’ve got to be willing to put it on the line and go after it. Nothing’s a guarantee, so there’s no rea- son to not give it everything you’ve got to go after what you want,” said Cox. Following the NCAA Championships Cox was unsure about wrestling in the Olympic Trials even though he qualified courtesy of his first place finish in New
York City. For starters, he had not been training any freestyle. Not to mention he wrestles collegiately at 197 pounds, com- fortably in between the Olympic weight classes of 86 kg/189 lbs. and 97 kg/213 lbs.
“I wasn’t planning on being here, I real- ly wasn’t,” Cox said. “Coach Smith is very convincing. He could tell you all about it. I wanted to take care of a few things, body wise, and I still plan on taking care of those things. I told you all, you would know if I was going to walk through that door, and when I did, you knew.” The Missourian elected to give it a go down at 86 kg, a weight class considered one of the deepest in the USA. Dropping to 86 kg was something that was deter- mined very early in the college season. “It was decided during the season. We knew the whole time we were going to go 86. We had been very close to making it public throughout the year,” he said. Cox entered the Olympic Trials as the No. 9 seed in his bracket with little to no external expectation of winning the whole thing. To say he exceeded expectations is putting it mildly.
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