Wrestling 2018-19

[ugarte]

Session II much better.

Second Round:

125: #8 Arujau MD 12-2 #9 Foley (Michigan State). Really great work. Dominant the whole way through. Big match vs #1 Rivera (Northwestern). Gets AA if he wins it.

141: #1 Diakomiahlis W 7-3 #16 Red (Nebraska) Weird match to call as two guys wearing red, one on a team called the Big Red and a guy named Red. Workmanlike win but he was never really threatened by a guy much better than his seed. Up next in the QF is #9 Demas (Oklahoma).

174: #16 Womack L 2-8 #1 Hall (Penn State). Never in doubt but a good effort t keep it under a major. He'll face #18 Morgan (Campbell) to stay alive.

184: #5 Dean W 6-4 SV #12 Wilcke (Iowa). Weird match. Dean gave up an escape, then the first TD, he escaped to make it 3-1 Wilcke, escaped again at the start of the third to make it 3-2 and then the scoring got weird. Wilcke got hit with his second stalling call (3-3) then Dean got a technical violation for hands to the face (4-3) and then Wilcke got dinged for stalling again (4-4) and the match went to overtime. In sudden victory, Dean pulled it out with a great takedown on the edge of the mat. Up next is #13 Bonaccorsi (Pitt), who knocked off the #4 wrestler.

Consolation Round 1:

133: #9 Tucker W 5-3 #25 Spann (Buffalo). Tucker made it interesting because he wasn't finishing his shots late and spent a lot of time in awkward defensive positions but he kept holding on. Up next is #10 Bravo-Young (PSU), which is going to be a really tough match.

197: #9 Honis W 8-6 #25 Bulsak (Clarion). Even more interesting - Honis had to come from behind with the benefit of a technical violation against Bulsak for locked hands to tie it up and then came out on top of a scramble with 4 seconds left for the win. Up next, #7 Aiello (Virginia) to stay alive.

285: #25 Sweany L 7-12 #26 Butterbrodt (Brown). 0-2 and out. Tough end to the season and career. Sweany was a three time national qualifier and had a few big wins but could never quite get over the hump.

After Day 1, Cornell is in 15th place with 11 points, a half point behind Lehigh and 4.5 out of the top 10. 3 wrestlers still alive in the championship bracket and 3 alive in the consolation bracket.

[ugarte]

Session III was solid.

QF:

125: #8 Arujau L 2-6 #1 Rivera (Northwestern). Rivera is #1 for a reason. Great job countering everything that Vito threw at him. Arujau is still alive and one win from All-American.

141: #1 Diakomihalis W 5-1 #9 Demas (Oklahoma). Yianni is an insane scrambler. No matter what Demas tried, Yianni ended up on top.Yianni is Cornell's first All-American of 2019.


184: #5 Dean W 6-0 #13 Bonaccorsi (Pitt). Monster strength. Countered for points and was a beast on top. Max is Cornell's second All-American of 2019.

Consolation 3:

133: #9 Tucker L 2-6 #10 Bravo-Young (PSU). Bravo-Young is crazy fast and did an incredible job of countering and scoring when Tucker took his chances. Disappointing for Tucker. Losing in the first round put him in a very difficult spot and RBY at #10 is a very tough draw. He'll be back.

174: #16 Womack W 9-5 #18 Morgan (Campbell) Crazy match. Up by one with RT locked for a 2 point lead and on top for a restart, Coach Koll gave him ONE instruction: "NO REVERSAL!" Morgan got a reversal almost immediately, but from bottom, Womack was able to get his own reversal and back points just before time expired for the win.

197: #9 Honis W 9-7 SV #7 Aiello (Virginia). Incredible back and forth match. Honis with a TD with 32 seconds left to take the lead, Aiello with an escape with 15 seconds left to go to overtime. In SV, Honis scored with 6 seconds left to move on.

Consolation 4:

174: #16 Womack L 7-11 #8 Skatzka (Minnesota) Skatzka was too strong. Match wasn't as close as the score, really. A solid tournament for Womack. Didn't lose to anyone he should have beaten. Wrestled exactly to seed. He's got one more year at Cornell as well.

197: #9 Honis W 10-5 #32 Laird (Rider) Laird scored the first two takedowns but the rest of the match was all Honis. Three takedowns of his own and he was a monster on top for riding time. One match away from All-American.

TONIGHT:

SF:

141: #1 Diakomihalis v #5 Eierman (Missouri) - Rematch of last year's semi. Yianni is 2-1 against Eierman in college.

184: #5 Dean v #1 Martin (tOSU) - Martin is insane. But I want to believe.

Blood Round: (winner gets on the podium)

125: #8 Arujau v #12 Fausz (NC State) - two guys with great international junior competition resumes. incredible matchup.

197: #9 Honis #21 Lane (Cal Poly) - seeding favors Honis but Lane has been wrestling out of his mind. Knocked off #12 and #5 before a one point loss to the #4.

Heading in to Session IV, Cornell is tied for 10th place.

[ugarte]

Vito wins. Yianni wins. more later.

[KenP]

DEAN!!!

[upprdeck]

that was an awesome finish

[ugarte]

DEAN!!!

so psyched.

Also Vito won again so he's in the consolation semi - win and he wrestles for third, lose and he wrestles for fifth. Facing #2 piccinini (Ok. St.).

Ben Honis wins one to become an All-American and loses the second, so he'll wrestle for 7th.

[CU77]

DEAN!!!

Dean's match starts a few seconds before 2:07:
http://www.espn.com/watch/player?id=ff71d0f9-bf75-4090-8625-df94902570ee
If the link doesn't work, it's the Mat 1 video.

[ugarte]

DEAN!!!

Dean's match starts a few seconds before 2:07:
http://www.espn.com/watch/player?id=ff71d0f9-bf75-4090-8625-df94902570ee
If the link doesn't work, it's the Mat 1 video.

Yianni is also in the Mat 1 video starting at around 36:00, and it's also an amazing white-knuckle ride.

[ugarte]

So, it's the morning after and I'm still floating on air. What an incredible session.

SF:

141: #1 Diakomihalis W 6-5 #5 Eierman (Missouri) - Facing Eierman, the only wrestler to beat Yianni in college,  Yianni got the first takedown then gave up a quick escape. Eierman got the second takedown and held on a little longer but Yianni escaped to tie the score at the end of 1 period. Yianni started the second period on bottm and Eierman held on long enough to get Riding Time over 1 minute, then Yianni escaped. He went into the final period up 1. In the third period, he held down Eierman long enough to get RT under a minute and with a little under 30 seconds left, Yianni struck - snatched an ankle and converted the takedown and held on (despite a pair of stalling calls) to win 6-5. Yianni is going to his second straight title match.

184: #5 Dean W 4-3 #1 Martin (tOSU) - Nobody thought that Martin was going to lose this year. He'd given up only a single takedown all season. He won the national title as a freshman and never finished lower than third. With Nickal bumping up to 197, 184 was considered his property. Dean and Martin had wrestled multiple times and lost 17-7 and 13-6. Last night, Martin again scored first but Dean escaped quickly. Dean escaped to tie the score to start the second period. In the third, Martin reversed to take a 4-2 lead but, again, Dean escaped quickly. With around 40 seconds left, Dean defended a shot from Martin and they got into a scramble, and with 10 seconds left, Dean came out on top to take a 1 point lead. Martin stood up to escape but Dean picked him up and slammed him back to the mat and ran the last seconds off the clock. Amazing. Dean is in his first national title match.

Blood Round:

125: #8 Arujau MD 11-3 #13 Fausz (NC State) Three takedowns, a two-point tilt, riding time... a dominant match (that I haven't watched yet). Arujau earns his first All-American in his first year.

197: #9 Honis W 8-5 #32 Lane (Cal Poly) - Honis scored twice in the first period and scored a reversal early in the second period to take a 6-1 lead and rode it to the finish. Honis spent the summer expecting to wrestle heavyweight and bulking up to 235 before Darmstadt got hurt and Coach Koll told him he'd have to cut back to 197. He had an incredible senior year and finishes it on the podium. Honis is an All-American.

Placement Round:

125: #8 Arujau W 8-5 #4 Bresser (Oregon State) Vito combined a strong ride with a 4 point takedown with a minute left to move into the consolation semifinal. Incredible.

197: #9 Honis L 5-7 #6 Miklus (Iowa State) Honis falls into the 7th place match with a tough loss to Miklus. Still an amazing run.

Session IV was incredible. Going 5-1 moved Cornell into 6th place in the team standings and a legit chance to move up to 5th.

Session V is in the morning and will have the 3/5/7 place matches after the consy semis set the 3rd and 5th place matches. Finals at night.

Session V 11am:

125: #8 Arujau vs #2 Piccinini (Oklahoma State) - The other consy semi is #1 Rivera (Northwestern) v #7 Glory (Princeton). Winners wrestle for third, losers wrestle for 5th. Either way Arujau gets a chance to avenge a loss. Rivera beat him in the QF and Glory beat him in the EIWA final. Vito pinned Glory when they wrestled at the Princeton dual.

197: #9 Honis vs #5 Warner (Iowa) - 7th place match

Session VI - FINALS 7pm

141: #1 Diakomihalis v #2 McKenna (tOSU) - Yianni won when the met a month ago and though the score was close, it was a pretty convincing win. This one matters more.

184: #5 Dean v #6 Foster (Northern Iowa) - Dean is 3-1 against Foster, including 2-0 this season.

This is going to be a wild day.

[ugarte]

Great start: Vito knocks off Piccininni 5-2* and will get a rematch with Rivera for 3rd place.

Maybe 5-1? I thought Arujau got a second stalling at the buzzer but maybe not.

[ugarte]

I know you were watching what sounds like the worst hockey game in history, from the final score to the officiating to the injuries. But while that was going on ...

Yianni Diakomihalis. two-time NCAA champion.

The rest of the day didn't go so well. Vito lost in the 3rd place match and finished in 4th. Honis lost in the 7th place match and finished in 8th. Dean lost in the championship match. Great results in the abstract, but not so great the day of.

Yianni, though.

I'll write more when I get up but it's 1 AM.

[CU77]

I watched the Yianni and Dean matches on replay, both very close, won on final takedowns, Yianni's in OT, and with a controversial call going Yianni's way at the end of regulation (I don't know enough about the rules to have an opinion on it). For Dean I'm guessing it was tough to be fully psyched after beating the previously undefeated #1 seed in the semis.

7th overall with 4 All Americans is a very good year. Congrats to the team and coaches!

[upprdeck]

I was curious.  Did Dean have caution warnings that he had to be that aggressive at the end ?

[LGR14]

I was curious.  Did Dean have caution warnings that he had to be that aggressive at the end ?

Dean was down one by virtue of Foster's having over 1 minute of riding time.  So Dean needed a takedown, or he needed to force two stalling calls on Foster, to get the match to OT.

[ugarte]

I was curious.  Did Dean have caution warnings that he had to be that aggressive at the end ?

Dean was down one by virtue of Foster's having over 1 minute of riding time.  So Dean needed a takedown, or he needed to force two stalling calls on Foster, to get the match to OT.

Dean was effectively *tied* because of the riding time and needed a takedown to avoid OT.

Koll said during a first period interview that the strategy was to wear Foster down and beat him in the third period, like they did earlier in the year. That went out the window when Foster rode Dean for most of the second period. Instead of getting an early escape and dishing two minutes of abuse, Dean had to spend the two minutes fighting off of bottom. If he'd gotten a reversal instead of an escape late in the second - he was so close - he'd have had a two point lead AND wiped out RT and could have spent the third period mostly defending a one point lead after Foster escaped.

Instead, when Foster stood up immediately in the third, the match was basically tied and it was more or less sudden death once the clock got down under a minute. Because he wasn't exhausted, Foster's quickness - what they were hoping to beat out of him - won the match at the end. I don't think anyone expected Foster to be able to ride Dean like that. Props to him. It was a great match.

My feelings on Yianni's match are as follows: https://twitter.com/Ugarles/status/1109840340469665792