Tag: NCAA Wrestling

3-points takedown college wrestling rule change ignites social media

Takedowns in college wrestling are now worth 3 points instead of 2. Twitter reacted to this massive change in the sport.

It’s late in the match. The score is deadlocked 1-1 between two fantastic grapplers. Neither is giving the other an inch or an in. This is high-level collegiate wrestling.

Suddenly, late in the third period, the hometown wrestler swoops in for a single leg. After a long struggle, he finally gets the better of his opponent. The jubilated crowd becomes unglued and responds with a roar, “THREE!”

Sounds a little bit weird doesn’t it?

The NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel oversaw a massive change to the sport this past week. Takedowns will now be worth three points instead of the traditional two points. The Panel explained in the official release that the new rules will reward offensive actions and help eliminate a lot of the passive stalling we see today.

Members of the Wrestling Rules Committee, which proposed the change, agreed that increasing the scoring for takedowns by an additional point will enhance the sport by rewarding offensive actions and risk-taking.

The committee also agreed there was a need to create a more appropriate point differential between takedowns and escapes and incentivize offense when competitors are in the neutral position. – NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel, NCAA.com.

The explanation does make sense. A lot of times in big matches you will see both sides pretty much come to a stalemate, neither side wanting to potentially give the other an opening. While some see this as the true strategy and mental game behind wrestling, other observers will criticize the lack of any action. If one wrestler deliberately doesn’t do much of anything, that’s stalling. However, if both competitors do, well, that’s strategic!

As you would expect, this new rule change caused ripples throughout the collegiate wrestling community. As expected, fans are extremely split on the decision and voiced their opinions on social media. Here are the best reactions to a massive change in college wrestling.

Austin O’Connor named ACC wrestler of the year

Austin O’Connor was named ACC wrestler of the year weeks after winning his second National championship.

North Carolina wrestler [autotag]Austin O’Connor[/autotag] is adding another honor to his already extensive career after being named Atlantic Coast Conference wrestler of the year.

The announcement came Thursday through an ACC press release. O’Connor shares this honor with Pittsburgh’s Nino Bonaccorsi as co-winners for the ACC, voted by the league coaches. O’Connor showed complete dominance this year as a graduate student, finishing with a 23-0 record at 157 lbs, including his second national championship during his tenure at UNC.

O’Connor Tar Heel’s legacy was already stamped before this season started. Still, after snagging his second NCAA title, his legacy became that more unique, becoming the second in UNC wrestling history to win multiple championships.

O’Connor has been special during his time at UNC, with a record of 131 wins and 13 losses. He has been especially dominant in the ACC, only losing once in the 18-19 season.

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NCAA Wrestling Championships, Finals, live stream, TV channel, how to watch

The NCAA College Wrestling Championships will reach the final day on Saturday night with 10 championship bouts from the Little Caesars Arena

The NCAA College Wrestling Championships will reach the final day on Saturday night with 10 championship bouts from the Little Caesars Arena in Detroit, Michigan.  Penn State is leading the way heading into the final day and will be looking for another win tonight to give them their ninth win in the past 13 years in the finals.

This will be a great night of NCAA Wrestling, here is everything you need to know to watch and stream the game.

NCAA Wrestling Championships, Finals

  • When: Saturday, March 19
  • Time: 7:00 p.m. ET
  • TV: ESPN
  • Live Stream: fuboTV (watch for free)

Odds and Betting Lines

NCAA odds courtesy of Tipico Sportsbook. Odds last updated Saturday at 5:00 p.m. ET.

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Iowa wrestler Spencer Lee gives raw, emotional interview after winning national title with torn ACLs

“We suffer together, we love together, we fight together.”

Athletes who have microphones stuck in their face repeatedly are conditioned to say less, to talk but reveal nothing, to get through each interview by compiling words robotically so they can move on.

This is reasonable: Those athletes have jobs to do and don’t want to create unnecessary buzz or cause for scrutiny.

As a result, 95 percent of interviews are as bland as overcooked oatmeal.

One antidote to this is to find the athletes who’ve worked just as hard, but in relative obscurity, at their moment of triumph. Then you get the good stuff, like this interview with Iowa’s Spencer Lee, after he won his third national championship at 125-pounds Saturday.

Wrestlers are different. You probably know that already. Much of the attention paid to this interview has focused on the early part, where Lee says he’s been wrestling with two torn ACLs.

“I’m wrestling with no ACLs. Whatever man. I didn’t want to tell anyone. Because eff excuses. Excuses are for wusses.”

While I love the toughness here, I’m definitely *that guy* who is going to stop here and say … Man, I hope Spencer Lee is able to heal fully at some point soon and go on to a long career and healthy post-wrestling life. He was set to wrestle for a spot in the Olympics last year; the trials were moved to April 2 of this year, which is less than two weeks away.

Lee has a limited window in which to make money from his sport — sure would be nice if he owned the rights to his name, image and likeness right now while he’s a living legend at a school where wrestling matters so much! — and NCAA schools do nothing to provide for the long-term care of athletes who are injured while competing.

Watching Lee’s achievement from afar is awe-inspiring, and you can tell how much it meant to him. But glory, we know, doesn’t pay the bills in the future — or dull the pain. Lee says not to worry about him, and sounds convincing. But …

So what resonates here, for me, is the dedication to his teammates. It’s beautiful. “We suffer together, we love together, we fight together.” He means it. You know he means it. There’s no doubt here whatsoever.

This level of togetherness is hardly a given. Wrestlers can be loners. Almost have to be, in some ways. So to hear this about the team that got Iowa its first team title since 2010 — an unfathomable drought for that program — is truly compelling, and we should be thankful that Lee shared it with us.

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Tom Ryan adamant about All-American wrestlers being recognized

College wrestling ended abruptly due to COVID-19. Ohio State’s Tom Ryan would like All-Americans recognized still.

Many winter sports ended abruptly due to COVID-19, and wrestling was left in a particularly odd place, having yet to announce All-Americans due to the NCAA Tournament getting shelved.

Ohio State’s Tom Ryan is not ok with that, and it’s anything but an act of selfishness.

He just wants his players recognized for their hard work. A top-five wrestling program in the nation, Ohio State, if Ryan’s concept would have been adopted, would have numerous All-Americans.

“There’s a possibility that you simply do like college football did before there was a playoff: whatever you were ranked in the last ranking, that’s where you finish. If you were ranked 1, you finish the season No. 1; if you were ranked 2, you’re No. 2; if you were ranked 7, you’re No. 7,” he noted on The Eleven Dubcast, an Eleven Warriors podcast.

For Ohio State, that’s like naming them the third-best team in football, although that really wouldn’t do much given the structure of their All-American selections.

It would matter greatly for wrestling. If Ryan’s ways were adopted, the program would have three first-team nominations, Luke Pletcher, Kollin Morre and Sammy Sasso. They’d have a second-team and third-team All-American as well in Kaleb Romero and Ethan Smith respectively.

“If you were ranked from No. 1 to No. 4, you’re considered first-team All-American,” Ryan continued. “If you’re ranked from No. 5 to No. 8, you’re second-team. And 9 to 12, you were third-team.”

Not giving winter athletes another year of eligibility is bad enough, but also not giving them the proper appreciation when they’ve worked their entire life for it is a completely different matter.

Ryan wants that to change, but who knows if he’ll get his way anytime soon.

 

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NCAA’s conundrum with wrestling and the Olympics

The NCAA has to figure out how to deal with the 2021 Olympics, assuming they happen. It’s not so simple for wrestling.

The coronavirus pandemic has obviously affected things far more important than sports all across the world. The impact on sports cannot be understated, though. The biggest domino in all of global sports fell on Tuesday, when the IOC announced that the Tokyo Olympics would be postponed until 2021.

This postponement will obviously have ripples throughout the sports world. Individual sports will have to figure out how to work around the Olympics. Will World Championships be held as scheduled, or postponed as they usually are in Olympic years? Will qualifying for Olympic sports reset? Will it be extended? Will deadlines for sports with rankings be based on this year’s rankings or next? All of these questions will have to be answered, of course.

For the NCAA, it will have a very unique set of problems for Wrestling.

Olympic Redshirt

NCAA Wrestling has a unique relationship with the Olympics. The NCAA allows any qualified wrestler (being qualified is essentially based on whether a wrestler has a serious chance of qualifying for the Olympics) to take off an Olympic season without using up a year of eligibility. The redshirted wrestler can train with his team but cannot compete in dual matches. The point of this is that the wrestlers is taking the year to train for the Olympics–so even though they are not injured, they get a redshirt.

Several of the top wrestlers in the NCAA–like Daton Fix, Yianni Diakomihalis, and Max Dean, among others–opted to take a redshirt in 2020. Diakomihalis, in particular, should have been expecting to medal in Tokyo. What happens to all of these athletes in 2021?

The basic principle behind the Olympic redshirt should still stand. Any wrestler who can qualify for Tokyo 2021–whenever and however that is–should be able to take the year to train without losing a year of eligibility. It seems like an easy decision, but it could be complicated further. Now students who were freshman in 2016 or 2020 could effectively be in college for seven years to wrestle (redshirts in three of 2016, 2020, 2021, and 2024). That’s a long time, even if we’re expecting them all to be attending graduate school.

Furthermore, the NCAA has a general problem of what to do about athletes in winter sports, which wrestling falls under. I’ve already made the claim that everyone should be granted another year of eligibility since they didn’t get to compete for a championship. But what happens to wrestling in particular?

Giving a second Olympic redshirt year will create a huge advantage for schools with athletes who have qualified players. Not only do they already have world-class wrestlers, but those wrestlers can still be competing in 2020. In fact, the existence of the redshirt already gives those schools a huge advantage if all wrestlers don’t get another year. These world-class wrestlers preserved a year of eligibility while the other top wrestlers lost one–and it didn’t cost the redshirts a chance at a championship.

The Olympic redshirt has the chance to create a huge inequality in 2021 and 2022, whether the NCAA grants a second year of it or not. Its very existence means that–unless the NCAA gives every wrestler who competed in 2020 another year of eligibility–those wrestlers who took one will be able to dominate college wrestling the next few years while most of their top rivals graduated.

Ohio State defeats Minnesota 22-13 in Top 5 wrestling bout

The No. 4 Ohio State Buckeyes defeated the No. 5 Minnesota Golden Gophers in one of the most anticipated wrestling duals of the season.

The No. 4 Ohio State Buckeyes traveled to Minneapolis to take on the No. 5 Minnesota Golden Gophers in one of the most anticipated wrestling duals of the season so far, and it did not disappoint. The Buckeyes were coming off a 26-10 loss to Iowa on Friday. There’s no shame in that, though, as Iowa is far and away the No. 1 team in the country right now. The Buckeyes showed in Minneapolis on Sunday night that they are not far behind, though.

The dual meet started at 157 pounds, because the 141- and 149-pound matches were expected to be the two best of the night–a decision that obviously turned out to be the correct one. Elijah Clearly of Ohio State couldn’t find a way past the defenses of Ryan Thomas, and lost a very close match. Cleary definitely has potential at 157, though his lack of positive results so far has to be a bit concerning as the season moves on.

Following that, Ethan Smith picked up a Major Decision and a team bonus point with a late takedown, while Kaleb Romero picked up a 2-1 win over Devin Skatzka with a late takedown of his own. The Buckeye came out with an important win in a Top 10 battle, something that will definitely be a big boost to his ranking and eventual NCAA seeding.

184 pounds looked like the potential weak spot in the lineup for Ohio State early in the season, but Rocky Jordan seems to have found his place in the lineup. He lost a very tight battle to No. 18 Owen Webster of Minnesota–getting turned for two back points early in the match was just barely too much to overcome–but the way he fought against a strong ranked wrestler shows that he should be fine for Ohio State in that slot when the NCAA tournament rolls around.

Kollin Moore earned a seemingly-routine Tech Fall to give Ohio State a 12-6 team score lead, and “Gas Tank” Gary Traub managed to keep his heavyweight match against prohibitive No. 1 Gable Steveson to just a Major Decision. At the time, that was big in the team score, though later matches would show it wasn’t quite necessary.

Minnesota took the team lead after Patrick McKee defeated Malik Heinselman at 125 pounds, but the Buckeyes wouldn’t lose another match from there. Jordan Decatur picked up some much-needed momentum with a strong Major Decision victory. Decatur had lost four matches in a row–and while all four were close matches against Top 10 wrestlers, consistently losing is never good for an athlete’s psyche.

No. 1 (141 pounds) Luke Pletcher gave up an early takedown to No. 5 Mitch McKee, but the Buckeye controlled the match from there for a solid victory. And, finally, Sammy Sasso followed his Friday upset of No. 1 Pat Lugo with a victory over No. 4 Brayton Lee, capped by a late takedown for the win.

Next… Season Outlook

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