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NAPLES — Obe Blanc has had the same goal since graduating from Lely more than five years ago — a national championship.

All the hours logged wrestling on the mats at Lock Haven University and the entire year Blanc trained for the Olympics were spent focusing on one thing — being the best college wrestler in the country.

After going as far as he could at his small Pennsylvania school, Blanc is now at the right place to win a championship. With one year left of NCAA eligibility, the former Lely standout transferred to Oklahoma State before the fall semester.

Blanc wrestled for three years at Lock Haven, claiming All-American status as a junior by finishing sixth in the nation, before taking a year off to try out for the Olympics. Now back from his sabbatical, Obe is hoping to finally accomplish his goal at one of the best wrestling schools in the country.

“During my year off I realized what it takes to win a national championship,” said Blanc, 23. “I didn’t feel Lock Haven had what I needed. Oklahoma State pretty much fit everything I was looking for.”

In the 81 years since the NCAA started crowning a team wrestling champion in 1928, Oklahoma State has won 34 titles. The school now synonymous with wrestling success, Iowa, is a distant second with 21 championships. The Cowboys won four straight national titles from 2003 to 2006.

Blanc will wrestle for Cowboys coach John Smith, a two-time Olympic champion and six-time world champion.

“He needed a place to be a national champion where he got to wrestle the best,” said Jeff Mustari, who coached Blanc at Lely and now coaches at Barron Collier. “It would be like playing football for Joe Paterno or Bobby Bowden.”

As a freshman at Lock Haven, Blanc redshirted and earned a bachelor’s degree in sports administration and a minor in business in four years at the school. Blanc said his move to Oklahoma State was about academics as much as it was about athletics.

Blanc is pursuing a master’s degree in international studies with a focus in international business. Blanc said he’d like to keep competing after his NCAA eligibility is up, but would eventually like to start a business career.

The Cowboys have started practice, and their intrasquad scrimmage is Nov. 13. The scrimmage consists of wrestle-offs that will determine the team’s starters.

Blanc is expected to start at 125 pounds, two classes above the 112 division where he won the 2003 state championship as a senior at Lely. He is receiving a full scholarship from Oklahoma State.

“(The Cowboys) were looking for someone at (125) because their guy just left,” Blanc said. “We both had the same goal and are looking for the same thing — a championship.”

Though Blanc hasn’t competed collegiately in more than 18 months, he doesn’t think the absence will hurt him. He spent all of last year training with former Olympian Cary Kolat at his wrestling school outside of Baltimore.

Training was a full-time job, Blanc said, and he also got to teach some at Kolat’s academy.

“I’ve never been around anything like that with that type of intensity and the mindset to push through anything,” Blanc said. “It was one of the best experiences in my life, not just in wrestling.”

Now, Blanc will be competing against some of the best every day at practice. The Cowboys had four All-Americans and one national champion on last year’s team.

“He’s at the best institution to be at to win a national championship,” Mustari said. “Obe’s got as good of a chance to win a national title as anyone out there.”