2026 NCAA WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIP

March 21, 2026

Landon Robideau

Rocket Arena

Finals Media Conference

157

Landon Robideau (Oklahoma State) d. (2) Antrell Taylor (Nebraska), 4-2

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by the 157 national champion, Landon Robideau, from Oklahoma State. When you heard that final whistle, and you realized you were the NCAA champion, what was your first thoughts going through your head and your journey to get here?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: I was super thankful. Obviously I've said it before in the semis, but I like to just thank my Lord and savior, Jesus Christ. And after that I saw my teammates, I saw D and Zack Ryder and all those guys supporting me. I saw my mom. I saw my brothers there.

And I just thought back to all the hard work I put in to get to this point and having them there mat-side supporting me means a lot.

Q. Can you just summarize your season and what it means to be in this moment here right now?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: It means a lot. Obviously, I had a pretty hot start to the season. I got really excited. And it's a long season. It's a hard season. Obviously there's ups and downs throughout, injuries, just hard times, life, everything like that.

To make it to the NCAA Tournament and be able to wrestle the best guys in the country and go out there and prove I'm the best in the country and get it done means a lot.

Q. You displayed a lot of grit, and you've got a real edge about you that carried you to this win throughout the whole tournament. Where does that come from? How do you channel all that energy and let that fuel you throughout your wrestling?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: I'm raised to have respect, wrestle hard. No matter what happens, it's wrestling, there's bigger things than wrestling. There's family, there's life, there's God. Everything like that.

But I just had an edge this year just because I know people are writing me off. They're talking about all these amazing sophomores, juniors, these other freshmen coming in. Obviously I was mentioned, but I felt a little bit disrespected and I just wanted to go prove it.

Q. I believe Antrell was your first loss of the season this year. Talk about what adjustments you made to get this win here tonight.

LANDON ROBIDEAU: I think it was just a lot of mindset. The first match, I went out there, it was just a weird match. It was in a weird part of the season. I just didn't put my best foot forward.

Obviously I wanted this match bad. At the end I'm usually not a person that gets in people's faces, but he was kind of disrespectful I thought to my coaches and was kind of up in their faces. So I wanted to show them this is for the national championship. You've gotta get hard when it matters most, and I was ready.

Q. Looked like quite a bit of stoppage for blood injury. Tell me, what's it like trying to stay hyped up, stay ready to wrestle? And how is your face feeling now?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: I hate it. I hate blood stoppage. I like to wrestle hard the whole entire time. I could hear boos, but if it was my choice, I'd wrestle full seven minutes, no breaks, nothing at all.

I just had to make sure I was focused, not really listening, just focusing on my coaches and the game plan and getting my mindset right and just going out and executing.

Q. I see D sitting over here with no shirt on. Did he give you the shirt off his back?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: Yeah, that's the kind of teammates we have. When I need a shirt, I'll grab it from D, I'll grab it from the other people. We've got a real brotherhood at Oklahoma State, and it's something I've never felt before even just going through high school, having really close friends. It's not the same.

Something's different in Stillwater. We just have the best people around us and I think it's kind of showing tonight -- how we're able to wrestle, go out and wrestle freely. We've got people supporting us the whole time and we're wrestling with smiles on our faces.

Q. What's the brotherhood of this freshman group like?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: I mean, obviously you've seen it, every person supporting everyone. Sergio won, and obviously you don't want to get too hyped up, just because I had a match to go get ready for. We got other people wrestling in the Finals.

I've seen that guy cut a lot of weight. I've seen him go, workouts at 12:00 at night just because he loves wrestling. We go workout at any time of the day. We're all together. We're always doing something together. When you have something like that, it just means a lot more, especially in these moments.

Q. Obviously Oklahoma State is standing out at this year's NCAA Tournament. What is it? Do you think it's the coaches? Is it the wrestlers coming in? What's the magic behind this?

LANDON ROBIDEAU: It's everyone. It's the coaches. They put a plan up for us. They asked us at the beginning of the year, what do you want to do? We had 10 guys say national champions. We didn't say -- one person -- I want to be an All-American. It was, I want to take first place. I want to be a champion. I want to be a dominant champion.

I think when you have 10 guys like that, and beyond that we have 15, we have 20 guys like that in the room, and you've got coaches holding us to that standard, it's impossible not to get better.