Go back a couple years and Gabriel Beyer was just picking up the sport of wrestling. Now the heavyweight prospect from Tallahassee (Fla.) is set to continue his mat career with Penn State, choosing the Nittany Lions over Big Ten rival Iowa.

In addition to being one of Florida's top high school wrestlers, Beyer is also a 6-foot, 273-pound nose guard and offensive lineman for Leon High School's football team and garnered some looks from Football Championship Subdivision schools. After a runner-up finish in the state wrestling tournament as a junior, however, coupled with standout performances at off-season competitions, Beyer decided in September that wrestling would be the sport that he ultimately pursued in college instead of football.

"I just made my decision recently within the past month or so," Beyer said. "Growing up I didn't know too much about wrestling. Wrestling is not too big where I'm from. I always had dreams of going Division I for football. Then it turns out that I ended up falling in love with wrestling."

Beyer first started wrestling as a sophomore. That year he finished with a 28-8 record before following that up with a 33-1 record as a junior. His only defeat was a close 7-6 loss in the FHSAA Class 2A state final.

Then this summer he arguably made his biggest splash on the wrestling scene after he went 13-1 at Disney Duals, beating four heavyweights who were ranked among the top 20 in the nation. Now Beyer is ranked as the No. 17 heavyweight in the country, according to FloWrestling.com.

After that performance at Disney Duals, which was an encore to a 14-1 performance the year prior, that's when Division I wrestling programs began to take a serious look. Among the schools that Beyer first talked to was Iowa, he said, but it wasn't until later when he got in touch with the Nittany Lions.

"A month after the Disney Duals this year is when all my recruiting started picking up," he said. "That's when I started talking to the bigger schools, but the main one I wasn't talking to was Penn State."

That's when he took it into his own hands.

"One of my football coaches has a good connection with Penn State, so my dad and I thought about it and prayed about it, and then filled out the questionnaire and sent Coach [Casey] Cunningham an email," Beyer added. "Then we started talking back and forth. He watched some of my videos. He really liked me. We got in contact, and then I went for an official visit there."

Beyer made the trip to Penn State Sept. 26 when the football team played San Diego State. The week before, he took an official to see the Hawkeyes, and the week after, Beyer used a third official visit to see Gardner Webb.

But his choice came down to the Big Ten programs.

"I was [deciding] between Iowa and Penn State, so I went on a visit to Iowa the week before I went to Penn State," Beyer said. "Those were my two main ones. I didn't want to commit right away, so I waited a good two or three weeks, took my time, prayed about it and really dug down to what I liked best about both schools."

Then on Oct. 16, he made the call, announcing for the Nittany Lions via Twitter.

"I love the atmosphere up there," he said, explaining his decision. "But the coaches - I really had a great time sitting and talking with Coach Cunningham and Coach [Cael] Sanderson. I love the campus. I love the people up there. I loved everything about it."

Although Beyer currently weighs just over 270 pounds, he said he aims to trim down in order to wrestle his senior season for Leon around 265. The Florida limit for heavyweight wrestlers is 285.

Beyer joins Penn state's Class of 2016, which already includes two blue-chip recruits in Nick Suriano (125-133) of Bergen (N.J.) Catholic and Mason Manville (157/165) of Wyoming Seminary. Luke Gardner (141/149) of Pottsville also recently announced for the Nittany Lions.

In redshirt freshman Nick Nevills, the expected starter at 285, Penn State has only one heavyweight on its current roster.