Wrestling 2019-20

[ugarte]

Both of Darmstadt's matches were worse on paper than they were on the mat tbh. He destroys anyone out of their depth. The loss to the unranked kid was a sloppy shot where he got caught awkwardly. He seemed embarrassed as he walked off of the mat. His loss to Venz had a lot to recommend it - a takedown, a reversal a minute on top - but goddamn, he and ...

Womack have the same stupid issue of overcommitting on top to dubious titling opportunities and ending up reversed. Both of them ended up pinned as a result, Womack in an 8th place match that he should have won BY LETTING THE GUY ESCAPE WITH 10 SECONDS LEFT. Womack looked terrible against Hemauer of Fresno State. Haven't watched the Mantananoa or Skatska matches yet but the results look better. That said, he was the 8 seed in an in season tournament and lost to 9 and 10.

Tucker's matches were fun because they were close but ... never close? Bridges in the final was close but even then, he took one real shot, converted it, and it was enough. Yapoujian was very disappointing. He didn't bother shooting at all in two full matches. Lost one in SV and the other right before SV. Blech. He has more in store than that but it was like a fifth-generation copy of Tucker that is distorted beyond recognition.

Baughman was fine. Looked good against the non-elite. He'll finally make the tournament, I think. Loew isn't ready to swim with the sharks yet but he's going to beat some R12 types.

LaJoie, Richard, Dawkins and Furman were all ... just kind of there. Nobody went 0-2, which was nice, but this just wasn't great.

[klehner]

On the plus side, Darmstadt has moved into 12th place on the all-time pins list...in less than 1.5 seasons.  He's one pin behind Realbuto.

[George64]

On a forward-looking note, how many of the Finger Lakes Ivyshirts do you think would start today?  Ramirez and Fernandez would have to be favored to take over at 165 and 285, right?  I'm not sure I would bet against Foca at 174 or Cardenas (when healthy) at 197 either.  Next year's team will be loaded if they can avoid injuries.

How about this lineup next year *and* the year after?

125:  Diakomihalis (Fr)
133:  Arujau  (Jr)
141:  Saunders (Fr)
149:  Diakomihalis (Jr)
157:  Yapoujian (So)
165:  Ramirez (Fr)
174:  Foca (Fr)
184:  Dean (Jr)
197:  Darmstadt/Cardenas (Jr/Fr)
285:  Fernandes  (Fr)

Future Cornellian Greg Diakomihalis in the Rochester D&C.

[ugarte]

Future Cornellian Greg Diakomihalis in the Rochester D&C.

thanks!

[klehner]

South Beach Duals opponents posted:  Minnesota, Michigan State, Wyoming, Missouri.

[ugarte]

The US Open was this weekend. Top 5 in each weight class qualify for the Olympic Trials, and Cornell had a bunch of entrants.

More info later, but Yianni Diakomihalis and Vito Arujau both qualified. Berreyesa finished in 6th; Max Dean, Frank Perrelli and recruit Josh Saunders also failed to qualify.

[ugarte]

The US Open was this weekend. Top 5 in each weight class qualify for the Olympic Trials, and Cornell had a bunch of entrants.

More info later, but Yianni Diakomihalis and Vito Arujau both qualified. Berreyesa finished in 6th; Max Dean, Frank Perrelli and recruit Josh Saunders also failed to qualify.

So, some more info.

Yianni had a few very good wins - the best, a quick 10-0 tech fall over Bryce Meredith (his opponent in the 2018 NCAA final). In the semi, he faced Joey McKenna - his intent in the controversial 2019 final - and lost on a last second takedown. He finished in 4th after "injury" defaulting out of the 3d place match; probably less actual injury and more "who cares" since top 5 qualified for the Olympic Team Trials.

Arujau finished in third, losing only to 2x NCAA champ Spencer Lee. He had two tech falls over Zach Sanders and a bug win over 2019 NCAA champ Nick Suriano. He didn't get a rematch against Suriano when Suriano suffered the same injury as Yianni in the 3d place match.

Garrett lost in the semis to 2015 NCAA champ Nathan Tomasello then opted to default to 6th. Unclear if it was the same injury. Probably was, since Garrett is also already qualified for OTT.

Dean had a couple of pins, beat the guys he was seeded ahead of and lost to the guys he wasn't. Really close matches with 6th seed/6th place Aaron Brooks and 8th seed/4th place Brett Pfarr.

Saunders finished in 8th. He lost to 7 seed Meredith twice and 4 seed Ethan Henderson in the 7th place match but won four matches along the way in the consolation bracket, including over 9 seed Dom Demas. Very impressive in a senior level tournament for a kid still in high school.

Perrelli finished in 7th but won only one match on the mat. He recieved a first round bye, his second round opponent somehow missed the call to the mat and his 7th place opponent forfeited.

This weekend Cornell goes to Miami for the South Beach Duals. They will face South Dakota State, Missouri, Minnesota, Michigan State and Wyoming. The other big news is that Ben Darmstadt has given up on the cut to 184 and had returned to 197. Jonathan Loew is moving down from 197 and switching places with him in the starting lineup.

[ugarte]

3-0 record in duals today. Wins over South Dakota State (18-16), Michigan State (20-16) and Wyoming (28-9).

Tucker, Womack and Darmstadt went 3-0, including two pins for Womack and a pin and a tech for Darmstadt. Clutch win for Furman at Heavy to win the SDSU dual.

[ugarte]

The second day of duals in South Beach was a split. A close, come-from-behind 19-18 win over Missouri and a loss to Minnesota. Tucker and Darmstadt went 5-0 for the weekend. Womack went 4-0. Unclear if he got hurt during his Missouri match. He spent most of the third period getting called for stalling but had built up a big enough lead that he still won; he sat out against the Gophers later that day.

Our greyshirts from Finger Lakes are in Chattanooga for the Southern Scuffle - the tournament Cornell used to travel to before South Beach was invented. Chris Foca is in the third place match at 174; Jacob Cardenas (197) and Louis Fernandes (Hwt) are in the 5th place match.

[ugarte]

Our greyshirts from Finger Lakes are in Chattanooga for the Southern Scuffle - the tournament Cornell used to travel to before South Beach was invented. Chris Foca is in the third place match at 174; Jacob Cardenas (197) and Louis Fernandes (Hwt) are in the 5th place match.

Foca lost in OT to #17 Bullard and finished in 4th.

Cardenas was not competitive with #6 Geer and finished in 6th.

Fernandes did a great job against #19 Miller and took 5th.

[ugarte]

Cornell's lineup - already taking a massive hit from the Olympic redshirts - has been fraying from injuries and it's possible that things got a lot worse over the weekend. Yapoujian (157) didn't wrestle in South Beach and still isn't back. Womack (174) didn't wrestle the final dual in South Beach after surviving the penultimate match by stalling away most of the cushion he'd built up; someone on another forum said that Womack's arm was in a sling. And now it's possible our best shot at a high podium placement - Ben Darmstadt - is hurt again.

As for the action, Cornell went 1-1 for the day with a win over Columbia and a loss to Lehigh (as expected).

The day started with a surprisingly close loss to Lehigh - particularly in light of the depleted lineup. LaJoie and Baughman both lost by a single point and reversing either result would have given Cornell the win. Cornell also got an encouraging upset when freshman Loew beat #21 Weiler (though Lehigh fans say Weiler was injured early in the match). It's also possible that you can read too much into the close team score since if Jordan Wood needed a major at heavyweight he may have tried to score more aggressively.

Against Columbia, despite a Lions lineup with two ranked wrestlers expected to win their matches, the Big Red almost swept the day. The dual got off to a good start as LaJoie and Baughman both upset their ranked opponents, sandwiched around a comfortable win from Tucker. Cornell's first loss came at 157. Adam Santoro had a late two point lead but rather than give up an escape, he got hit with a second stalling warning, which meant an escape would tie the score and send the match to OT. Trying to hold on, he put himself in an awkward position and Columbia scored a defensive pin (you can see the final position in the Columbia recap. Then at 197, Ben Darmstadt was scoring comfortably when ... something happened with his ribs. He tried to fight through it, and even kept scoring, but he had to stop the match three separate times because of the pain and eventually threw in the towel. Hoping it isn't too serious but I don't expect to see him for a few weeks at least.

#19 Cornell vs. #14 Lehigh
125: #5 Brandon Paetzell (LEH) dec. Dom Lajoie (COR), 5-4 [LEH 3-0]
133: #5 Chas Tucker (COR) dec. #10 Nick Farro (LEH), 6-4 (SV-1) [3-3]
141: Dan Moran (LEH) dec. Noah Baughman (COR), 2-1 [LEH 6-3]
149: Hunter Richard (COR) major dec. JT Cooley (LEH), 13-3 [COR 7-6]
157: #10 Josh Humphreys (LEH) dec. Adam Santoro (COR), 6-2 [LEH 9-7]
165: Brian Meyer (LEH) dec. Jake Brindley (COR), 3-1 (SV-1) [LEH 12-7]
174: #2 Jordan Kutler (LEH) major dec. Milik Dawkins (COR), 9-1 [LEH 16-7]
184: Jonathan Loew (COR) dec. #21 Chris Weiler (LEH), 8-6 [LEH 16 -10]
197: #10 Ben Darmstadt (COR) major dec. #18 Jake Jakobsen (LEH), 8-0 [LEH 16-14]
285: #9 Jordan Wood (LEH) dec. Brendan Furman (COR), 5-0 [LEH 19-14 FINAL]
 
#19 Cornell vs. Columbia
125: Dom Lajoie (COR) dec. #23 Joe Manchio (COL), 8-5 [COR 3-0]
133: #5 Chas Tucker (COR) dec. Trent Svingala (COL), 8-2 [COR 6-0]
141: Noah Baughman (COR) dec. #23 Matt Kazimir (COL), 3-1 [COR 9-0]
149: Hunter Richard (COR) major dec. Andrew Garr (COL), 8-0 [COR 13-0]
157: Kyle Mosher (COL) def. Adam Santoro (COR), Fall (6:42) [COR 13-6]
165: Andrew Merola (COR) dec. Riley Jacops (COL), 3-2 [COR 16-6]
174: Milik Dawkins (COR) dec. Lennox Wolak (COL), 4-0 [COR 19-6]
184: Jonathan Loew (COR) tech fall Michael Baker (COL), 18-2 [COR 24-6]
197: Sam Wustefeld (COL) by medical forfeit over #10 Ben Darmstadt (COR) [COR 24-12]
285: Brendan Furman (COR) dec. Danny Conley (COL), 7-0 [COR 27-12 FINAL]

[mountainred]

Other than Ben's injury, it was a positive Saturday.  As they say, "other" is doing a lot of work in that sentence.

The greyshirts had a nice weekend at the Shorty Hitchcock.  Jacob Cardenas won at 197 pounds; Ramirez took 2nd at 165 (though he was schooled by a former 4-time AA in the finals); Fernandes took 3rd at 285 (he lost to a stud Penn State recruit in the semis and had 3 one minute pins); and Reinche finished 5th at 174 (losing only to the eventual runner-up in first round).

[ugarte]

The greyshirts had a nice weekend at the Shorty Hitchcock.  Jacob Cardenas won at 197 pounds; Ramirez took 2nd at 165 (though he was schooled by a former 4-time AA in the finals); Fernandes took 3rd at 285 (he lost to a stud Penn State recruit in the semis and had 3 one minute pins); and Reinche finished 5th at 174 (losing only to the eventual runner-up in first round).

Thanks; I saw the Ramirez news (losing to Fittery is not a bad result) but didn't think to check on the rest of the FLWC.

[ugarte]

Before we get destroyed by Virginia Tech later today I should mention that we pulled off a huge upset of Rutgers on Friday with a severely depleted lineup.

Forget about the missing Olympic redshirts; since December we've lost our starters at 157 (Yapoujian), 174 (Womack) and 197 (Darmstadt). Still, we got huge wins from Baughman, Santoro and Brindley, Chas Tucker remains undefeated and Hunter Richard had a clutch third period pin which was the difference in a dual where both schools won at 5 weights.

[ugarte]

VT dual was much more fun and closer than I expected.

At 125 LaJoie almost beat another ranked opponent. Tucker remained undefeated at 133 with another win against a ranked wrestler. At 141 Baughman held off a major decision against a returning national qualifier.

Hunter Richard came back from down 5-0 to beat the #22 wrestler at 149 8-7 in sm incredible match. Santoro was so close to a comeback against #13 but couldn't quite get the lady points he needed (and actually ended up giving up 6 when his move didn't work out).

Brindley was facing #3 at 165 and avoided a MD with a stunning late takedown and rideout.

Andrew Berreyesa opted out of his Olympic redshirt year and returned to the lineup for the first time at 174. Right off the bay he hit a great throw for a 6-0 lead that I can't believe wasn't called a pin. He held on to win 8-4. He's still going to go to the Olympic trials.

Loew was able to keep it close against #2 to avoid a major.

Fagen and Furman... lost.

Still, for a dual that looks like a blowout it went much better than I thought it would. Especially good to see Berreyesa back and Richard really improving as the year progresses.