Since its debut on October 15, 2018, the NCAA portal has given student-athletes a clear window to explore new opportunities—but it’s also amplified the pressure to find the perfect fit. Last season alone, more than 2,800 FBS football players and roughly 2,700 other Division I scholarship athletes submitted their names—nearly one-quarter of all FBS scholarship holders—into that digital marketplace. For Mitchell Mesenbrink, that digital marketplace didn’t feel like an opportunity; it felt like a trap—a scary, disorienting plunge.
Wrestling hasn’t seen quite the same tidal wave of departures, yet every offseason still funnels dozens of grapplers toward greener pastures. For Mesenbrink—already a contender at 165 lb—his first portal entry brought anything but relief. The process left him emotionally spent and questioning whether college wrestling was even where he belonged. It wasn’t until a gut-check visit to Penn State under four-time Olympic gold medalist Cael Sanderson that he found the clarity to stay in the sport and, ultimately, the path to a national title.
“Honestly, what happened the first time with having to enter the transfer portal, I never wanted it to happen again,” Mesenbrink says of that initial portal entry—an emotionally draining journey that nearly made him walk away. In a revealing conversation on Nickals and Dimes, the national champion peeled back the curtain on how close he came to choosing a different life before Penn State entered the picture.
“I was ready to just get my degree online and just do freestyle,” he confessed. “I was looking into becoming a firefighter or something like that. If that’s how wrestling was going to be, I was going to be done.” It took a deeply honest conversation with his parents and his coach, Ben, to help him see through the chaos. “My mom said, ‘If you don’t go to Penn State, you’re always going to wonder what if.’ And she was totally right.” After all, those monumental milestones were just around the corner at Penn State.
The gut feeling that changed Mitchell Mesenbrink’s life
Even during the visit, Mesenbrink recalled feeling a powerful internal confirmation. “I was sitting at practice and then that gut feeling—that nervous, uneasy [feeling]—I personally believe that God speaks to us through intuition. And I just felt like, ‘This is it’.”
His gut was right. Since joining Penn State, Mesenbrink hasn’t just found success; he’s found his rhythm. Training under Cael Sanderson and scrapping daily with elite teammates like Kyle Dake, he found the challenge and mentorship he craved. The results speak for themselves.
Mesenbrink, who won an NCAA title this season in the 165lb category, is preparing for Final X and has re-emerged as a top prospect on the senior freestyle circuit. He’s been able to scrap with some of the best in the world, pushing himself every day. And that competitive intensity has helped him unlock another level.
Reflecting on how close he came to quitting, Mesenbrink shared a deeply human truth: “I want to enjoy the sport. If I’m not going to enjoy it… I was going to be done.” Now, with Penn State behind him and Final X on the horizon, it’s clear that the terrifying uncertainty of the transfer portal became the fire that forged a new chapter.
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