Here are 5 things we learned from Penn State wrestling’s wins over Lehigh and Penn
Penn State wrestling wrapped up the first half of its season this weekend with wins over Lehigh and Penn, before heading into a long break.
The Nittany Lions don’t have another varsity event scheduled until their Jan. 10 dual against Illinois. But that doesn’t mean individual Nittany Lions won’t be competing. Some, such as Anthony Cassar and Vincenzo Joseph, plan to compete in Senior Nationals Dec. 20-22 in attempt to qualify for the Olympic trials in April. Some of the redshirts might also compete unattached at the Southern Scuffle, coach Cael Sanderson said earlier.
Until then, here are five things we learned from Penn State’s double-dual weekend.
1) Aaron Brooks is a game-changer for Penn State
Since Penn State unleashed the highly touted true freshman on Friday against Lehigh, Aaron Brooks has already shown himself to be one of Penn State’s most dangerous weapons.
He looked sharp in both matches, posting three quick takedowns and a reversal in his 10-5 decision over Lehigh’s Chris Weiler, and poured on the points against Penn freshman Jesse Quatse, tallying seven takedowns a four-point nearfall en route to a technical fall at the 6:03 mark.
“That being his first match Friday, I didn’t know what to expect,” Sanderson said after the Penn dual on Sunday. “Really, he was one of our guys who wrestled best. So I think that’s pretty impressive. He’s just relaxed and focused and ready to go. I think he brings a lot to the team. I think he wrestled well and I’m glad he wrestled these two weekends to give him kind of a head start.”
With the top-ranked Hawkeyes dominating every opponent they’ve wrestled so far, adding Brooks into the lineup helps ease some of the uncertainty in Penn State’s lineup, giving them a better shot at beating out the Hawks to win their fifth consecutive NCAA title in March.
Sixth-year senior Shakur Rasheed has been the presumed starter at 184 this season, but has yet to take the mat, as he’s recovering from offseason ACL surgery. Redshirt freshman Creighton Edsell filled in for Penn State in its opening dual against Navy, picking up a win in his debut. But Edsell didn’t weigh in against Arizona State due to a “late development,” and Penn State was forced to forfeit the weight, ultimately costing the Nittany Lions the dual and breaking their 60 straight win streak.
Sanderson is certainly not a guy accustomed to losing, and plugging Brooks into the lineup helps give Penn State that “X factor,” of not only a guy who’s capable of wining big matches, but also doing so with bonus points.
The only question now is, what happens to Rasheed? Will he bump up to 197, where he made All-American two seasons ago to replace a struggling and injury-prone Kyle Conel? Time will tell. But one thing is clear, Sanderson certainly has a plan.
2) Lineup battles continue
With the first half of the season in the books, it doesn’t look like the battle for the 149-pound spot has become any clearer. In dual meets, junior Luke Gardner has the edge over teammate Jarod Verkleeren, going 2-0 with a pin of Navy’s Jon Park and a 7-6 decision over Penn freshman Lucas Revano, a top-100-ranked recruit by FloWrestling.
Verkleeren has so far gone 0-2 in duals, losing to a close 5-4 battle to Arizona State’s Josh Maruca, and in sudden victory to Lehigh’s Jimmy Hoffman. But it was Verkleeren who came out on top in the pair’s only public wrestle-off, winning 3-2 in the finals of the Black Knight Invitational. However, it was Gardner who took the initial wrestle-off in practice, 4-2, according to PA Sports Network’s Jeff Byers.
In past years, Penn State’s lineup battles would oftentimes sort themselves out at the Southern Scuffle at the beginning of January. But since the Nittany Lions don’t plan to send their full team to Chattanooga, it will be interesting to see how they plan to settle this one.
While alternating duals seems to be the answer for now, that means that whoever ultimately wins the battle will have half as many matches under their belts than most of their opponents come March. And for two guys who have yet to wrestle a full collegiate season, that experience will be crucial.
While it appears Brody Teske is the presumed starter at 125 pounds, fellow redshirt freshman Brandon Meredith is taking advantage of his opportunities in the starting lineup with Teske out, and making the four-time Iowa state champ work to keep his spot.
Meredith bounced back from a major decision loss to Lehigh’s No. 11 125-pounder Brandon Paetzell with an 8-5 upset of Penn’s No. 10 Michael Colaiocco. A big win like that will only help to boost Meredith’s confidence.
3) Kyle Conel showed resiliency
Graduate transfer Kyle Conel has struggled throughout his career with injuries. It was a shoulder injury about a year ago that caused him to miss the 2018-19 season at Kent State, and allowed the NCAA to reward him with an extra year of eligibility.
It appeared to be another upper body injury that Conel sustained Sunday, wrestling against State College grad Cole Urbas, with the bulky knee brace he’s been wearing all season on his left leg. When Conel went down, he writhed in pain, clutching his shoulder as he rolled around on the mat. He stayed down for about a minute, before getting back up, shaking hands with Urbas and continuing the match.
While Conel did hold on to finish the match for the 6-5 win, he was clearly in pain. Urbas rode out the whole third period, picking up two stalling points and nearly amassing over a minute of riding time to tie the bout.
Even Penn coach Roger Reina was impressed by Conel’s determination to push through the injury and finish the match.
“I’ll give him tremendous credit. I know he’s had shoulder injuries, and he suffered that injury during that match,” he said. “I think he showed a lot of courage to continue.”
If the line of thinking that Rasheed will bump up to 197 pounds once he’s healthy proves to be true, Sunday could have been Conel’s last match. If so, he went out proving he’s a fighter.
4) Mark Hall wants more than just another NCAA title for his senior year
Since before the season even started, 2017 national champion Mark Hall made clear what his main focus was for his senior season —another national title.
While some of his teammates, such as Cassar and Joseph, plan to compete at Senior Nationals in Fort Worth, Texas, Dec 20-22, to qualify for Olympic Trials at the Bryce Jordan Center, Hall said his focus will remain on winning an NCAA title and qualifying for trials that way.
“I’m not too worried about the Olympic Trials quite yet,” he said last week. “I’ve got a pretty good career at this point that I want to finish off strong. And so whether qualifying for the Olympics at that tournament is in the cards or not, it’s not really that big of a deal to me. I’m just looking to keep getting better in here and help the team get better as well.”
But Hall doesn’t want to just win an NCAA title, he wants to make this his best season yet, and set himself up for a shot at the Hodge Trophy, awarded each year to the most outstanding collegiate wrestler. The honor was awarded to his former teammate Bo Nickal last season, and Zain Retherford the two seasons before that.
Sanderson said the Apple Valley, Minnesota, native has spent the first part of the season working on improving his top game, and so far, that work has paid off. Hall is 7-0 with three pins, a technical fall and a major decision. One of his non-bonus-point wins was a hard-fought 7-2 decision over Lehigh’s No. 2-ranked Jordan Kutler. Already, Hall has twice as many pins as he did last season.
“I know when Jason and Zain and Bo and those guys were wrestling, fighting for a Hodge Trophy, they weren’t doing it by, they were good at taking guys down and letting them go, but they were returning guys, they were pinning guys,” he said after the Kutler win. “And that’s what I’m looking forward to learning and knowing how to do.”
With FloWrestling’s preseason Hodge favorite Seth Gross, of Wisconsin, losing a couple weeks ago to Iowa’s Austin DeSanto, Hall should be near the top of the Hodge rankings, along with Arizona State’s Valencia, Iowa’s Spencer Lee, and teammates Joseph, Cassar and even junior Nick Lee, depending on how he matches up with Ohio State’s Luke Pletcher, who’s been dominating this season since he’s moved up from 133 pounds.
While several of the top NCAA wrestlers have mixed aspirations this season between college and the Olympics, Hall appears to be completely focused in on finishing his collegiate career strong.
5) Penn State doesn’t want to lose again
Penn State suffered its first dual meet loss in nearly five years on Nov. 22 when it fell 19-18 to Arizona State on the road. While Sanderson and his wrestlers have repeatedly said they didn’t pay attention to “the streak” and are mainly just focused on the NCAA tournament in March, clearly the loss did sting.
“Loses are painful. Everyone of us is sick to our stomach right now,” assistant coach Cody Sanderson told the Pa. Sports Network after the loss.
Since then, the Nittany Lions have shown they’re serious about getting back into the game — and not losing. The first indication was pulling Brooks’ redshirt in their first dual after the loss. Had Brooks wrestled against Arizona State and kept the match against two-time national champ Zahid Valencia to less than a tech fall, there could’ve been a different outcome.
The second indication was Penn State’s decision to weigh in multiple wrestlers at five different weights on Sunday. The Nittany Lions had two wrestlers ready to go at the contested weights of 125 and 149 pounds, but also weighed in both Edsell and Brooks at 184, Conel and sophomore Austin Hoopes at 197 and Cassar and freshman Keagan Carmenatty at heavyweight.
Why? “Because we weren’t quite sure what we were going to do,” Cael Sanderson said.
He said that from the beginning of the year, the Penn dual was one that they had planned for Cassar not to wrestle. Cassar is wrestling a modified schedule this season, as he simultaneously trains to defend his NCAA title and make the Olympic freestyle team.
But because, Sanderson said, Penn is a “good young team,” he wanted to have Cassar available in case the dual were to come down to the final bout.
Penn State isn’t taking any chances.
This story was originally published December 9, 2019 at 3:52 PM.
