Penn State wrestling’s Brady Berge medically forfeits out of Big Tens — and how PSU fared in consolations
(Note: You can find the most recent story of Penn State’s time at the Big Ten championships, and how they won their first tile since 2016, right here.)
The final day of the Big Ten wrestling championships is meant for crowning champs and advancing as far as possible in the consolation brackets.
With six Penn State wrestlers in the finals, that meant there wasn’t much action for the Nittany Lions in the consolations early Sunday. But three wrestlers — Roman Bravo-Young, Nick Lee and Brady Berge — still competed in the tournament’s third session to try to reach the third-place match of their respective weight classes.
Only two ended up making it to the mat. Berge medically forfeited at 149 pounds.
Wrestling resumes at 4 p.m. Sunday with a live broadcast of the finals, third-place and fifth-place matches on the Big Ten Network. In the meantime, here’s a look at who competed in Sunday’s earlier session:
133 Pounds: Roman Bravo-Young
Record for championships: 3-2
Current round: 5th-place match
Recap: Bravo-Young looked out of his element in the first period against Iowa’s Austin DeSanto in the consolation semifinals.
DeSanto made four takedowns look easy on the true freshman in the first period as he built up an 8-3 lead. Bravo-Young didn’t help his cause in the second period by giving up a stall point and trailed 10-3 to start the third period.
The Penn State wrestler seemed to get a feel for things early in the third period and got things rolling. However, it was a little too late as he dropped a 13-8 loss.
141 Pounds: Nick Lee
Record for championships: 2-1
Current round: 3rd-place match
Recap: Lee got paired up with Wisconsin’s Tristan Moran in the consolation semifinals. When the two met earlier in the season, in January, Moran handed Lee his only loss of the regular season in a 12-10 sudden-victory win.
Lee look poised and ready to avenge that loss from the opening whistle. He raced out to a 7-1 lead after two periods using three easy takedowns on Moran.
Lee continued to roll into the third period with his fourth takedown, a stall point from Moran and a riding-time point for a dominant 11-3 major decision.
Lee will take on Minnesota’s Mitch McKee for third place later on Sunday.
149 Pounds: Brady Berge
Record for championships: 2-1
Current round: 5th-Place Match
Recap: Penn State tweeted out early in the third session that Berge was not going to wrestle on the day.
PSU stated that he was officially medically forfeiting, but the actual reason is unknown. He didn’t appear to get injured on Saturday. It has been rumored that he has struggled with the weight cut, but coach Cael Sanderson has declined to address that speculation.
He had also missed several duals during the regular season for unspecified reasons.
Nittany Lions’ medal matches (Sunday’s final session)
133: Bravo-Young vs. Michigan’s Stevan Micic, 5th place
141: Lee vs. Minnesota’s Mitch McKee, 3rd place
149: Berge vs. Minnesota’s Thomas Thorn, 5th place
157: Jason Nolf vs. Nebraska’s Tyler Berger, finals
165: Vincenzo Joseph vs. Iowa’s Alex Marinelli, finals
174: Mark Hall vs. Michigan’s Myles Amine, finals
184: Shakur Rasheed vs. Ohio State’s Myles Martin, finals
197: Bo Nickal vs. Ohio State’s Kollin Moore, finals
285: Anthony Cassar vs. Minnesota’s Gable Steveson
Other championship matches
125: Northwestern’s Sebastian Rivera vs. Iowa’s Spencer Lee
133: Ohio State’s Luke Pletcher vs. Rutgers’ Nick Suriano
141: Nebraska’s Chad Red vs. Ohio State’s Joey McKenna
149: Rutgers’ Anthony Ashnault vs. Ohio State’s Micah Jordan
Big Ten Championships
Sunday at Minneapolis
Team key: Illinois (Ill.), Indiana (Ind.), Iowa (I), Maryland (MD), Michigan (M), Michigan State (MSU), Minnesota (Minn.), Nebraska (Neb.), Northwestern (N), Ohio State (OSU), Penn State (PSU), Purdue (P), Wisconsin (W)
Consolation Semifinals
133: Austin DeSanto, I, major dec. Roman Bravo-Young, PSU, 13-8; 141: Nick Lee, PSU, major dec. Tristan Moran, W, 11-2; 149: Cole Martin, W, med. forfeit Brady Berge, PSU
This story was originally published March 10, 2019 at 3:26 PM.
