Friday afternoon, Jeremy Johnson found himself in a match as pressure-filled as any first-year college wrestler could expect.
He was at the United States Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, wrestling freestyle in the Junior World Team Trials.
Johnson, an 18-year-old freshman who redshirted his first year at Ohio, reached the final round after winning twice to begin the tournament.
On the line was a trip to Budapest, Hungary, to wrestle for Team USA in the Junior World Championships.
All that stood in his way was a best-of-three series with Steve Andrus, a sophomore at Michigan State who beat Johnson in a qualifying tournament a month earlier.
For most wrestlers, the final round of the trials would be the biggest event of their wrestling careers. But Johnson was not anxious, knowing he performed on even bigger stages while at Brecksville-Broadview Heights High School near Cleveland.
I was used to the atmosphere of big tournaments
Johnson said. I'm used to the pressure of those big matches.
Johnson capped a successful high school career by winning a national title at the USA Cadet and Junior Freestyle & Greco-Roman Championships in Fargo, N.D.
He won the event - the biggest national tournament in high school wrestling - as a senior wrestling freestyle in the heavyweight division.
My high school coach put me in those positions Johnson said. Now (coach) Joel (Greenlee) and (the other coaches) are putting me in the same
positions in college.
His experience was one reason Johnson brought confidence into the match with Andrus. Another factor was the Colorado air.
Johnson acclimated to the thin air after wrestling two matches, but Andrus had been waiting to face Johnson and did not get the same workout in beforehand.
I felt like I was pretty warmed up and I felt like he couldn't beat me in three matches Johnson said.
It turned out Andrus could not beat him at all.
Johnson defeated Andrus twice in a row to secure his place on Team USA. Johnson won 1-0 and 3-1 in the first match and 1-0 and 4-0 in the second.
I wrestled better than him this time
Johnson said. It feels awesome.
Johnson understandably had trouble ranking the win among his career achievements.
So plentiful were Johnson's high school accomplishments that his victory at Fargo was not the reason he was featured in Sports Illustrated's Faces in the Crowd.
What landed him in the Aug. 24, 2009, edition of Faces in the Crowd, a weekly feature in SI that highlights the best performances of non-professional athletes, was his individual championship at the ASICS/Vaughan Junior National Championships.
SI also mentioned his Division I state title at 285 pounds as a senior.
It's pretty cool
Johnson said about Friday's win. I've always been on national teams
but I've never been on Team USA. ... Being on Team USA definitely sounds way sweeter but winning Fargo was pretty sweet (too).
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Nathaniel Maund
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