The USA has a long history of successful Olympic Wrestling campaigns, but they had not won gold in London until Burroughs defeated Iran's Sadegh Goudarzi 1-0 1-0 in the 74kg Freestyle class tonight.
Burroughs, the poster-boy of Wrestling in the USA, made his determination to win in London clear when he chose the Twitter handle @alliseeisgold, and he did not let the opportunity to top the podium slip by.
The 24-year-old started competing in international tournaments less than two years ago, but he showed no nerves tonight, clinching the first period after taking the Iranian down.
The second period looked set for a stalemate until Burroughs picked up Goudarzi and dumped him off the mat with barely 10 seconds left.
Uzbekistan's Soslan Tigiev and Russian Denis Tsargush claimed bronze medals.
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