Jesse Mendez has lofty goals for himself and the entire Ohio State wrestling team going into the 2024-25 season and beyond.
Coming off a national title at 141 pounds, Mendez will be the favorite when the NCAA Tournament returns to Philadelphia in 2025. Sure, there will be others in the mix, such as Northern Colorado’s Andrew Alirez if he stays at 141.
But, that won’t stop Mendez from trying to put himself in the history books when it’s all said and done.
“Yeah, I don’t want to just be a one-timer,” Mendez said on the Baschamania Podcast. “I want to be, well now it’s a three-timer. I (wanted) four-timer but you know sometimes things don’t work out the way you want it. So I want to go on, win two more, try to get two Hodge trophies and I’m just not very satisfied with where I’m at right now.
“I want to keep getting better and I have aspirations to be an Olympic champ, world medalist, world champ, and um, you know, one national title doesn’t get that done. So keep working with my head down.”
Mendez went 29-2 last year, winning the national title over Penn State’s Beau Bartlett, whom he won two of three matchups last season.
Ohio State had numerous injuries during the 2023-24 campaign, thrusting in some young guys into the lineup. It didn’t matter as Ohio State was one of the better teams all season long anyway.
That included Mendez being joined by freshman Rocco Welsh in the NCAA finals. Welsh lost the 174 pound final to now-four-time champion Carter Starocci (Penn State).
But Mendez firmly believes next year’s Ohio State team can get it done and climb the mountaintop.
“Yeah, I mean, this was a weird season,” Mendez said. “We had I think it was four All-Americans get hurt mid-season. And we had a lot of young guys step up. And I’m just super excited for this young team. We got a lot of hammers and they’re as tough as nails. So I’m excited. They’ve been working all summer. You know, we’ve had 98% of our team in the room all summer. So now these guys are tough, they’re young. They’re they’re hungry and they want to win national titles. So when you get a team like that, it’s exciting.
“It gets me excited and you know, I want to help do whatever I can, I want to lead them. And, you know, we want a team title. We don’t want just individual titles. We want to be that team that’s holding the trophy up at the end of the year.”
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