Gable Steveson focused on WWE career, not returning to college wrestling

Olympic gold medalist Gable Steveson is focusing on his WWE career instead of making a return to college wrestling.

Steveson stated last summer that he planned to return to the University of Minnesota in 2024 for his final year of college eligibility. At the time, Steveson said that he would need to sort out his scheduling details with WWE before making his return official.

But University of Minnesota head wrestling coach Brandon Eggum shared an update on Thursday announcing that Steveson won’t be competing for the school this season. Eggum said WWE prefers that Steveson is solely focused on his pro wrestling career at this time.

“Unfortunately, [Steveson] will not be able to compete for us this season,” Eggum said. “He is a great competitor. He’s always wanted to compete for the University of Minnesota, but ultimately the WWE would prefer that he’s solely focused on his professional wrestling career at this time. So whenever he’s not at the WWE Performance Center down in Florida, he’s up here in our realm working with our heavyweights, which is awesome.”

Eggum said the University of Minnesota can’t thank Steveson enough for the impact he’s had on their wrestling program. Eggum said they’re looking forward to watching Steveson’s career in WWE moving forward.

WWE announced the signing of Steveson in September 2021. He’s only had one televised match since then, facing Baron Corbin at NXT Great American Bash 2023. The match was six minutes long and ended in a double countout. The crowd turned against Steveson in the match and cheered for Corbin.

Steveson has wrestled at NXT house shows since then. Last Friday, he worked a dark match against Cedric Alexander before SmackDown.

“Gable Steveson is booked for SmackDown tapings, likely dark matches, for the next few weeks,” Dave Meltzer wrote in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.