Bottom line...You can't take a year or two off from wrestling at a high level and expect the same results. College coaches know this and understand the disadvantage but it still might discourage them if they feel the athlete isn't being challenged or progressing. Don't dismiss it, Academics also factors in as quality in education is huge. At this point high school coaches aren't recruiting athletes, athletes are choosing programs that even allow wrestling. These kids committed to wrestling year round since they were 5 and could be denied the opportunity to wrestle at all. I also saw a post accusing CV of holding kids back to have an age advantage...really?!🤥 Check the age group their kids competed in. They are all young. There's not 19 yr old post grads like you commonly see in other elite programs back east. The real disadvantage for these kids is that as an 18 and 19 yr old college freshman they could face opponents in college that are 26! Redshirts, Olympic Redshirts, Covid and injury. This makes full rides very hard to come by. It will be difficult to nearly impossible to crack the lineup as a true freshman anywhere. Corvallis also has the only RTC in the Northwest...big factor! Lots of factors but having great friends and partners might be the biggest draw. Good kids and great role models for up and coming wrestlers. Hopefully that makes more sense now. Oregon collectively should be proud of their state as a whole and pulling for all their kids on the national and international level. Tougher competition only makes you tougher. Cali kids are tough because they don't have 6 divisions, they only have 14 State Champs! Iowa, Ohio, Michigan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania...? They don't care who's wrestling for who, they welcome it! Coaches that think they have it all figured out better realize they have to progress just as much as their athletes. I don't care where you're from. The resources are there but that's on them if they aren't taking advantage of it. Don't blame the kids or parents that do. Do you have a 185 to 220 lb that wants to roll? Rylan does not care if you're from Roseburg, Newburg or anywhere else. He enjoys wrestling and you'd probably enjoy having him in your room. Some parents and coaches ruin that for their kids with their whining, griping, competitive nature and of course the drama. Sorry for the lengthy post...not trying to draw attention just encouraging open conversations, after all this is a "forum". You are afforded the right to keep scrolling but if you got this far obviously you didn't exercise it!😆