IU meets Purdue in conference opener

Senior Mike Dixon anxiously lined up across from his practice partner. As sweat increasingly faded the letters on his IU football T-shirt, Dixon lunged forward and locked arms with his counterpart. Seconds later, he towered over his fallen opponent like any linebacker gloating after a quarterback sack.\nBut Dixon doesn't do his tackling on the gridiron anymore. Instead, he's resumed his wrestling career after spending the better part of this season with the football team.\n"Every year I was asking myself, can I really play in Big Ten football?" said the senior heavyweight. "It was my last year here. I didn't want to leave saying 'could've, should've, would've.'"\nDixon decided to join the football team in the final days before training camp in August. A former football standout at Lawrence Central High School in Indianapolis, Dixon said he felt compelled to prove something on the field, if only to settle his own curiosity.\n"I had missed football a lot, because it was my original love in high school," Dixon said. "I always watched all the IU games, and I always thought I'd play football when I got to college. I played with a lot of guys that are here on the North/South All Star team my senior year."\nThe 22-year-old senior said he received nothing but support from his coaching staff on the wrestling team.\n"I was all for it," head coach Duane Goldman said. "He likes football and wanted to give it a shot because he would have liked to play, but it was also an opportunity to gain weight and lift."\nPhysically, there was little doubt the powerfully built Dixon would be able to endure the rigors of college football, even after the five-year layoff. But there's a lot more to football than physical ability.\n"I had to get used to the hitting a little bit because I hadn't done it in a while, but that didn't take very long," Dixon said. "The hardest thing was just learning all the defensive schemes. For the first three or four weeks, I was still trying to get into it."\nDespite not dressing for the Hoosiers, Dixon stayed with the team all season and received scout team player of the week honors for his efforts in preparation for the Cincinnati game. Perhaps the most impressive aspect of his short-lived college football career was his work in the weight room.\nRegardless of his previous success, Dixon was always one of the lightest heavyweight wrestlers around. Between off-season training with assistant coach Charles Burton and the intense weight training regimen of the football squad, Dixon packed on 20 pounds of muscle. He is now 232 pounds of finely chiseled power, with speed and a linebacker's ferocity, Burton said.\n"I watched him just get bigger and bigger," said Burton, who trained with Dixon before wrestling for the United States in the 2000 Olympics. "By the time we got to July and right before I left for Sydney in August, he was too big for me to wrestle." \nBurton and Dixon make frequent practice partners, as few of his teammates can handle Dixon's brute strength.\n"We scrap pretty good," said Burton of his practice time with Dixon. "I'm not going to concede anything, but if he hits me at the right angle, he'll blow right through me. He's 230 pounds of raw muscle."\nThe added weight has affected Dixon's performance on the mat. After an impressive 1999 season that was capped off with an invitation to the NCAA Championship, Dixon saw his production dip last year and finished with an overall record of 15-20. Although he had just a couple of weeks to make the transition from football back to wrestling, Dixon has burst out to a 10-4 start.\n"It's been probably his best season so far," Goldman said. "He's always been pretty effective in his wrestling, it's just that he's been too small."\nDixon used to rely on his quickness to counter his heavier opponents, not unlike a linebacker working against an offensive tackle. But the added power has made him a much more dangerous opponent these days.\n"Instead of giving up 60 pounds a match, I'm not giving up nearly as much," Dixon said. "I've been able to dominate the mat for the most part this year. I can push guys around and put them where I want to be, instead of them pushing me around."\nAlong with the added muscle, Dixon's agility is still a big part of his strategy.\n"I'm not as heavy-footed as my opponents. I'm able to move a lot smoother than everybody else," he said. \nDixon will receive many chances to prove his dominance in the upcoming weeks against Big Ten competition, including an anticipated matchup this weekend against Illinois' John Lockhart, the nation's fourth-ranked heavyweight. The two met last year in a close bout with Lockhart getting the edge, 4-3.\n"He's a tough kid, he's real tough to score on," Dixon said. "But I'm a lot bigger this year, and my offense is a lot better. But one of the things I learned in football is to take it one game at a time. I don't really look ahead."\nWhile the team's success is first and foremost among his priorities, Dixon said he would still relish another opportunity at the NCAA Championship.\n"It's in the back of my mind," he said. "Obviously, you always have the big picture in mind, but right now I'm just focused on beating Purdue."\nWith football season over, Dixon has no choice but to press on and keep winning.\n"I really wanted to see what I could do in Big Ten football," he said. "I wish I would have come out earlier, maybe freshman year. But I'm thankful for wrestling. If I had to do it all over again, I would"