11 NCAA D1 Wrestling team titles in 16 years. A resume like this is enough for you to have many haters, and that exactly seems to be the case for Penn State. Under the guidance of Olympic gold medalist Cael Sanderson, the NLWC has become arguably the top wrestling program in the country in recent times. And with that, it’s only natural that the former Penn State star Bo Nickal would defend his alma mater with militant enthusiasm.
When a team shines as bright as Sanderson’s boys, their opponents tend to look for any number of reasons to undermine their success. However, the current UFC star and 3x NCAA gold medalist Nickal knows that it takes more than allegations of paying top dollar to athletes for retaining them to make them stand out from the rest of the crowd.
Bo Nickal makes his stand clear, irrespective of the community’s convictions
It all started when Bo took a subtle dig at Penn State’s biggest rivals on Sunday. On February 23, Iowa and OSU locked horns in what was projected to be a clash of two NCAA behemoths. The Blackhawks won the dual 21-16, but Nickal wasn’t impressed. “Enjoyed watching the most expensive dual in the history of college wrestling tonight,” the ex-NLWC wrestler took to X to mock the rather drab nature of the match and insisted that Penn State always makes things more interesting.
Kids go to PSU to win. Kids go elsewhere to get paid. Nothing wrong with that at all but it’s true. https://t.co/yFPQxAMwhe
— Bo Nickal (@NoBickal) February 24, 2025
Naturally, not everyone was on board with the potshot. One fan, looking to get back to Nickal, instead claimed that it was the program’s incredibly big fund that helped to hone talent. “To pretend like PSU hasn’t been dropping a bag on their lineups for the past 8 years is nasty work,” the fan replied, and Bo Nickal didn’t waste much time before snapping back.
“Kids go to PSU to win. Kids go elsewhere to get paid. Nothing wrong with that at all but it’s true,” the three-time B1G gold medalist piped on February 24, with a tone that made it clear that Sanderson’s wisdom can never be smeared by allegations such as these. For the unwary, the whole fiasco regarding how much Penn State wrestlers are paid got a significant bump last year, when rumors about Carter Starocci making approximately $1.25 million for his fifth year started doing the rounds.
In August, the 4x NCAA champ fueled the fire with another snarky comment on X. “Don’t speak about my pockets. Yall don’t know the half of it,” he wrote as a response to Pursuit Wrestling’s post and even insinuated that he probably was the highest paid collegiate wrestler in the country. Talk about shaking things up, huh? However, on the other hand, according to some sources like ZipRecruiter, the average salary of Penn State wrestlers is just below $20/hour, which would make it understandable as to why Bo Nickal isn’t ready to cede grounds without a fight. But while he continues to stand by the NLWC with vigilance, it’s probably this kind of cutthroat environment that deters him from wanting to come back to the NCAA circuit.
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