On Blue White Illustrated’s message board, The Wrestling Room, it has ben a topic that sparked the creation of at least nine new threads with 2,560 replies and a total of more than 288,000 views.

Some may call it the biggest storyline of a college wrestling off-season that also included a period of time Cael Sanderson might have been without a contract.

Nick Suriano, the Nittany Lions’ starter at 125 pounds, is transferring. His desired destination? Rutgers. While the news has been rumored since late June, Penn State officially confirmed the reports Tuesday and removed the Paramus, N.J., native from the official roster.

"Nick Suriano recently requested a release so that he could transfer to Rutgers,” a Penn State spokesman said in a written statement. “We granted this release. Subject to Big Ten policy, any intra-conference transfer is required to sit for one year before they are again eligible to participate. Nick is open to transfer to Rutgers and will be subject to that school's policies (conference or otherwise) on transfer and eligibility status. We support and work within the Big Ten policy.”

The latter portion of the release from the PSU athletics communications department is in response to a report that broke Monday afternoon from NJ.com that suggested Penn State was blocking the request.

In accordance to conference rules Suriano would lose a year of eligibility by transferring to his in-state program, a requirement for anyone from any sport who transfers from one Big Ten school to another. The only way to bypass that regulation is if both schools sign off on the waiver, which Penn State has not been willing to do.

Suriano has yet to publicly acknowledge his decision to leave the defending NCAA champions. Blue White Illustrated has been unable to reach him for comment, despite multiple attempts.

As a true freshman in 2016-17, Suriano started his career winning 16 of his first 17 matches. Then in Penn State’s “Dual Championship Series” match at Oklahoma State in February, Suriano rolled his ankle. He defaulted that match due to injury before forfeiting his first bout at Big Tens, which marked the second and third losses on his record. Although he wasn't officially ruled out of competition by Sanderson until the day before NCAAs, Suriano did not compete at the national tournament either.

Without Suriano, Penn State has three 125-pounders on its current roster in junior Kenneth Yanovich, sophomore Patrick Higgins and redshirt freshman Devin Schnupp.