2021 NCAA Champion Shane Griffith (Photo/Tony Rotundo; WrestlersAreWarriors.com)This evening, Shane Griffith announced via social media that he would remain at Stanford.
In July of 2020, Stanford stated that they would eliminate wrestling along with ten other sports following the 2020-21 school year. Griffith and his teammates remained at Stanford and persevered through a season that was shortened via Covid and even forced them to practice outside, at times. Despite these hurdles, Griffith, the eighth-seed at 165 lbs ran through the weight and became only the second Cardinal wrestler to win an NCAA title.
Shane's title and the aftermath, which included the entire arena chanting "Keep Stanford Wrestling", generated nationwide headlines. Along the way, the boosters and alumni raised enough money to save the program.
After the NCAA season concluded, the Cardinal head coach Jason Borrelli left to take the same position at American University. Over the Memorial Day weekend, the wrestling community was abuzz as former Cornell head coach Rob Koll accepted the Stanford job. With a coach of Koll's caliber at the helm in Palo Alto, some thought that Griffith would reconsider transferring. He, along with many other Cardinal wrestlers, had been in the transfer portal for most of the 2021 season. Today those hopes were confirmed.
Griffith is 40-1 through two years of competition at Stanford. He is a two-time Pac-12 finalist and one-time champion. Shane was named an NWCA first-team All-American as a freshman after going undefeated and garnering the third seed at the NCAA Championships (which were cancelled). At the 2021 NCAA Tournament, Griffith upset top-seeded Alex Marinelli (Iowa) in the quarters, before dominating #5 Zach Hartman (Bucknell) in the semis. He grabbed his national title by taking out #3 Jake Wentzel (Pittsburgh), 6-2.
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