Three Penn State wrestlers earn U23 World Championship crowns. Here’s how
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Penn State placed three wrestlers with U23 world titles and one bronze.
- Mesenbrink, Lilledahl and Haines won finals using technical superiorities.
- Incoming freshman PJ Duke secured bronze; Barr, Welsh and Blaze had early exits.
The United States U23 world team had 10 wrestlers compete in the U23 World Championships in Novi Sad, Serbia starting on Friday.
Penn State had seven of those wrestlers competing.
The Nittany Lions’ Mitchell Mesenbrink, Luke Lilledahl and Levi Haines all collected world titles, with incoming freshman PJ Duke earning a bronze medal. Transfer Rocco Welsh, incoming freshman Marcus Blaze and NCAA runner-up Josh Barr also hit the mat for the US.
Mesenbrink earned his gold on Saturday with Lilledahl, Haines and Duke collecting their medals on Sunday.
In the finals, Mesenbrink gave up an early takedown to Turkey’s Muhammed Ozmus, but those were the only points Ozmus scored. The defending 165-pound NCAA champ scored 12 unanswered points to record a 12-2 technical superiority in 2:59 to win the 74-kilogram weight class.
Mesenbrink got started on Friday, and was dominant from the start, using a pair of technical superiorities to reach the semifinals. He outscored his opponents, 22-2, in 4:39 of wrestling.
In the semifinals, the Penn State wrestler topped Japan’s Yoshinosuke Aoyagi, 7-4.
Lilledahl hit the mat first on Sunday for his 57-kilogram title match against Japan’s Yuta Kikuchi.
He led 1-0 after one period as Kikuchi gave up a passivity point. In the second period, Lilledahl got another passivity point, but tacked on a takedown on the edge of the mat late for a 4-0 title.
With the win, Lilledahl has now won a world title at the U17, U20 and U23 levels.
Lilledahl had just six points total scored against him during his title run. He opened with a 10-0 technical superiority in 4:25, and reached the semifinals with an 11-5 win over Iran’s Milad Valizadeh on Saturday.
In the semifinals, the NCAA third-place finisher had no problems in a 7-1 win over Russia’s Aiandai Ondar.
Haines, who came up short of a 79-kilogram gold in the Senior World Championships last month, was dominant in his gold medal run at the U23 Championships.
In the finals, Haines gave up an initial pushout point to Turkey’s Ibrahim Yaprak, but that was it. The Nittany Lions wrestler fired off a pair of four-point throws to go up big early.
Haines then got a takedown of Yaprak, and later got a push out for the 11-1 technical superiority in 2:37.
The champ only had four other points scored against him, all in the semifinals. Haines began his title run with a pair of shutouts, outscoring his opponents, 17-0, on Saturday.
Duke made the 70-kilogram semifinals with ease on Saturday, but suffered a 14-4 technical superiority loss to the eventual champion in Azerbaijan’s Kanan Heybatov in 5:15.
In his bronze medal match on Sunday, Duke rebounded nicely by pinning Armenia’s Davit Margaryan in 2:59.
Barr reached the quarterfinals on Friday, where he suffered a 13-3 technical superiority loss to the eventual champion in Iran’s Mohammadmobin Azimi. Barr had the ability to wrestle for a bronze medal on Saturday, but he suffered an injury in that loss that kept him from competing.
Welsh cruised to the quarterfinals at 86 kilograms on Sunday with a pair of technical superiority victories. However, he suffered a 7-4 loss, which was his final match of the championships.
Blaze suffered a 4-2 loss in his one and only match of the tournament on Sunday.
