West Virginia University senior Greg Jones cruised to his third career national wrestling title on Saturday evening at the NCAA Wrestling Championships in St. Louis.

In the title bout at 184 pounds, Jones' headgear gave him more trouble than his opponent. The Slickville, Pa., native easily defeated seventh-seeded Tyler Baier of Cornell, 5-2, although the score doesn't demonstrate just how dominant the No. 1 seed in the weight class was en route to becoming just the 39th wrestler in NCAA history to win three national championships.

Jones has now won back-to-back titles at 184 pounds while failing to allow an offensive point to be scored against him in both of the past two year's championships. Jones ends his Mountaineer career with three NCAA titles, four EWL titles and a career record of 126-4 (25-0 this season) while finishing on a school-record 51-match winning streak.

In the championship bout on Saturday, Jones struck early with a powerful double-leg takedown 48 seconds into the first period to claim a 2-0 lead. After Baier was released for an escape, Jones headed into the second period with a 2-1 advantage.

Jones began in the bottom position to start the second period and earned an escape in five seconds. Forty seconds later he scored another double-leg takedown for a 5-1 lead. The only other scoring the rest of the way were two escapes by Baier, one if the second period and one in the third, as Jones, who three separate times had to fix his headgear, released his opponent without a fight both times.

Jones won his first national championship at 174 pounds as a freshman in 2002, but after going unbeaten in the regular season his sophomore year, he lost twice in the NCAA Championships and failed to place. That made him more determined, and since that time Jones has gone an amazing 51-0 with back-to-back national titles at 184 pounds. He will undoubtedly go down as one of the greatest all-time athletes in any sport in WVU history.

West Virginia's previous national champions in wrestling were Scott Collins (177-pound weight class) in 1991 and Dean Morrison (177) in 1994. But Jones holds the proud distinction of being the school's only three-time national champ.

Earlier Saturday, WVU junior Matt Lebe finished in seventh place in the 157-pound weight class with a 6-5 victory over Clarion's Chris Horning. Lebe, who entered the tournament as the No. 7 seed, went 5-2 in the national tournament and earned All-America status after coming one victory shy of receiving that honor a year ago at the NCAA Championships.

Lebe finishes this season with a 37-8 record. The 37 wins mark the most victories by a Mountaineer in a season since All-American Mike Mason went 39-6 in 1998.