Being the head wrestling coach at Penn State isn't an easy job.

The pressure to succeed is intense, the recruiting wars can be savage and the schedule is always a gantlet of America's top teams.

But this is what faces Troy Sunderland each and every season at the helm of the Nittany Lions.

What Sunderland is asked to do is nothing short of incredible. He is expected to build a team of at least 20 high-caliber wrestlers so depth is sufficient, with only the dollar equivalent of 9.9 scholarships. He then has to take that team and send it through a murderer's row of a dual meet schedule, win about 75 percent of those matches and then, somehow, make a final push to finish in the top five or ten at the NCAA tournament.

In this month alone, the Lions have faced or will face top-10 teams Lehigh, Oklahoma, Michigan and Illinois. That's like asking JoePa's boys to line up against Southern Cal, Miami, Texas and LSU next October. Oh yeah, and they only get 21.9 scholarship players to do it.

As if that didn't sound like enough fun, Sunderland then gets to hit the recruiting trail in the offseason, fight with the 10 other Div. I programs in Pennsylvania and fend off the out-of-state vultures coming in from Oklahoma and Iowa.

If he can do all of that, then he appeases one of the most expectant fan bases in the country for another year and earns the right to start all over again.

Lucky him.

It's not a job for the faint of heart. And at first, it didn't seem like it was the job for Sunderland, either.

After guiding the team to a fourth-place finish at the NCAA tournament in 1999, his first season in charge, the program sank into a period of depression. The departures of stalwarts like Jeremy Hunter, Clint Musser, Glenn Pritzlaff and Ross Thatcher in a two-year period dropped the overall talent level in the wrestling room dramatically, and it showed.

In 2001, Penn State finished 10th in the Big Ten and in 2002 the Lions finished 35th at the NCAA Championships. At Penn State, those numbers are unacceptable and the criticism came onto Sunderland in waves.

For Troy Sunderland and his program, things were pretty bleak.

"Early on there were some moments when I felt like I wasn't the man for the job," Sunderland admitted.

But quitting isn't how Sunderland became a three-time All-American in the early 1990s at Penn State, reaching the finals twice and becoming a legend for the Lions in the process, and quitting was never an option, even during the darkest moments. There was only one way out: patience and hard work.

Last season, things got much better. Sunderland was Big Ten Coach of the Year and Penn State finished sixth in the country. This season can potentially be even better. The Lions are 7-2 and are among a handful of teams with a legitimate chance at both the Big Ten and NCAA crowns.

"In terms of winning and losing, this has been by far my most enjoyable season," Sunderland said. "I knew when I took this job that it would be challenging. It's similar to when I was training to win a national championship as a wrestler. It's a never-ending job; it's on your mind all of the time. But now, instead of just looking out for myself, I have to look out for 39 other people."

Sure, it's a tough job. But through his trials and tribulations, he seems to have figured it out.

Two wrestlers for Penn State, Josh Moore and Pat Cummins, headline this season. Neither won a PIAA championship in high school, neither had Oklahoma State or Minnesota knocking on their door. But they came to Penn State and worked with Troy Sunderland, and now they are both on track to go for gold at the NCAA tournament in two months.

That says it all right there.

"When you don't win a state championship and then, four years later, you're ranked number one or two in the country, that doesn't happen very often," Sunderland said. "Everything that went into that, the training, the dieting, the improvement, I think that's a great testament to our program."

Moore and Cummins and the rest of the 2003-2004 team are a great testament to their program and their coach. They stuck by Sunderland and he stuck by them.

Now, this year and in the future, it will all pay off.