By Jim Caple
ESPN Senior Writer
IOWA CITY, Iowa -- Wrestling legend Dan Gable, who was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member in 1980, was in bed at five in the morning on Feb. 12, 2013, when his wife woke him with some alarming news. The International Olympic Committee had just announced it was dropping wrestling from the Olympics, beginning in 2020.

"She happened to be on the Internet and she said, 'I think you better get up,'" Gable recalled. "I said 'Why?' I rolled over and she told me, and I said 'That's just a rumor.' And then I got up and found out it wasn't."

And how did Gable react when he learned it was true that wrestling had been dropped? "I cried."

The news shook the wrestling world, from Iran to Iowa, where Hawkeyes wrestling coach Tom Brands, who was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member in 2001, called the announcement "worse than death." Jesse Thielke, who was the Dave Schultz High School Excellence Award winner for Wisconsin in 2011, said it was a bombshell that made no sense, given wrestling is one of the original Olympic sports. Two-time Olympian Elena Pirozhkova thought it had been a joke initially. Three-time All-America Tony Ramos, who was the Dave Schultz High School Excellence Award winner for Illinois in 2009, said the announcement coincided with his birthday, "so that's something I'll never forget."

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