Wrestling 2022-23

[ugarte]

Mostly backups wrestled this weekend at the Mat Town Open in Lock Haven. Colton Yapoujian got his first matches since his 2021 injury and he cruised to three straight wins, including a 16-0 tech, a pin in a minute and a 7-0 win over teammate Cole Handlovic (who wrestled at 141 last year and would wrestle at 149 but for the 600lb gorilla in red) in the final.

The only other notable performance on the Cornell roster was Ethan Fernandez, who won another tournament at 133 in Vito Arujau's absence.

The real notable performance comes from a senior in high school who will probably be on the roster next year at 149: Meyer Shapiro.* Shapiro is spending his senior year in Ithaca competing with the Spartan Compat Regional Training Center instead of wrestling for his high school. He is a Maryland wrestler who went to Pennsylvania wrestling factory Wyoming Seminary for his Junior year and is a 2021 Cadet freestyle world champion. The competition wasn't very deep, but in his four matches he won three by fall and beat future Cornell teammate Owen Finn by major decision. Yianni's going to graduate after this season and it's incredible that we aren't going to see much fall-off from a 4x champ.


* pronounced Sha-PIE-ro

[mountainred]

Yianni's going to graduate after this season and it's incredible that we aren't going to see much fall-off from a 4x champ.

I believe in Yianni too, but aren't there wrestling gods to worry about?

[ugarte]

Yianni's going to graduate after this season and it's incredible that we aren't going to see much fall-off from a 4x champ.

I believe in Yianni too, but aren't there wrestling gods to worry about?

hmm

[Swampy]

Yianni's going to graduate after this season and it's incredible that we aren't going to see much fall-off from a 4x champ.

I believe in Yianni too, but aren't there wrestling gods to worry about?

hmm

If Meyer Shapiro belongs to the tribe his name sounds like, there's just a wrestling god (singular) to worry about.

[ugarte]

Yianni's going to graduate after this season and it's incredible that we aren't going to see much fall-off from a 4x champ.

I believe in Yianni too, but aren't there wrestling gods to worry about?

hmm

If Meyer Shapiro belongs to the tribe his name sounds like, there's just a wrestling god (singular) to worry about.

that god hasn't cared about a wrestler since jacob

[abkay]

Will wrestling remain a dominant program going forward without Andy as AD?

[scoop85]

Will wrestling remain a dominant program going forward without Andy as AD?

Fair question. Colgate doesn't have wrestling, while UNC, where Moore worked previously, has a solid program. But hard to imagine she'll be as invested in wrestling as Noel has been.

[mountainred]

Will wrestling remain a dominant program going forward without Andy as AD?

Fair question. Colgate doesn't have wrestling, while UNC, where Moore worked previously, has a solid program. But hard to imagine she'll be as invested in wrestling as Noel has been.

Plus, 11 years at Oklahoma, which takes wrestling seriously.  I'd hope she would be invested in one of the few Big Red sports with national title aspirations (hockey, lax, wrestling, and ).

[ugarte]

Will wrestling remain a dominant program going forward without Andy as AD?

Fair question. Colgate doesn't have wrestling, while UNC, where Moore worked previously, has a solid program. But hard to imagine she'll be as invested in wrestling as Noel has been.

Plus, 11 years at Oklahoma, which takes wrestling seriously.  I'd hope she would be invested in one of the few Big Red sports with national title aspirations (hockey, lax, wrestling, and ).

AS invested? idk - Noel was a wrestler himself and also coached the team for a while. That said, I can't imagine she'd come into a situation where the school has a nationally competitive team and a very generous alumni base who have been shoveling cash into the program and screw it up. I suspect she's sharper than that. I also suspect that Noel impressed the importance of the wrestling program upon her during the search process because it's obviously very important to him.

[Swampy]

Will wrestling remain a dominant program going forward without Andy as AD?

Fair question. Colgate doesn't have wrestling, while UNC, where Moore worked previously, has a solid program. But hard to imagine she'll be as invested in wrestling as Noel has been.

Plus, 11 years at Oklahoma, which takes wrestling seriously.  I'd hope she would be invested in one of the few Big Red sports with national title aspirations (hockey, lax, wrestling, and ).

Polo? Crew? Soccer? (The latter might kill 2 birds with 1 stone because we could also call it "football." After all, A. D. White did spend substantial time in England.)

[Swampy]

One thing I'd expect, with considerable legitimacy, is for her to prioritize bringing women's sports up to substantive (quality) rather than formal (financial) parity with men's sports. This is already true in ice hockey, but I'm not aware of anything similar in our other more successful men's sports (lax, wrestling, etc.) Of course, other sports might be viable alternatives, which is why Cornellians might have to learn that ice hockey is one of two forms of hockey played at the intercollegiate level.

Lacrosse and basketball are obvious candidates.

[Weder]

One thing I'd expect, with considerable legitimacy, is for her to prioritize bringing women's sports up to substantive (quality) rather than formal (financial) parity with men's sports. This is already true in ice hockey, but I'm not aware of anything similar in our other more successful men's sports (lax, wrestling, etc.) Of course, other sports might be viable alternatives, which is why Cornellians might have to learn that ice hockey is one of two forms of hockey played at the intercollegiate level.

Lacrosse and basketball are obvious candidates.

Women's lacrosse definitely has the potential to be a very strong program and reached the final four in 2002. More recently, they had a nice run of NCAA tournament appearances a few years back. The number of women's lacrosse programs is far higher than the number of men's, and the Ivies have remained relatively strong. Basketball is tougher, but Princeton has shown it's possible to build a nationally relevant program. I feel like the women's rowing team should be stronger, though the balance of power in women's crew has really shifted away from the Ivies and to the big state schools.

[Swampy]

One thing I'd expect, with considerable legitimacy, is for her to prioritize bringing women's sports up to substantive (quality) rather than formal (financial) parity with men's sports. This is already true in ice hockey, but I'm not aware of anything similar in our other more successful men's sports (lax, wrestling, etc.) Of course, other sports might be viable alternatives, which is why Cornellians might have to learn that ice hockey is one of two forms of hockey played at the intercollegiate level.

Lacrosse and basketball are obvious candidates.

Women's lacrosse definitely has the potential to be a very strong program and reached the final four in 2002. More recently, they had a nice run of NCAA tournament appearances a few years back. The number of women's lacrosse programs is far higher than the number of men's, and the Ivies have remained relatively strong. Basketball is tougher, but Princeton has shown it's possible to build a nationally relevant program. I feel like the women's rowing team should be stronger, though the balance of power in women's crew has really shifted away from the Ivies and to the big state schools.

I wouldn't expect women's basketball to be nationally relevant anymore than I'd expect this of men's basketball. In this century Sweet 16 appearances occur perhaps once per decade, if only we should be so lucky.

But just as we'd be satisfied with an Ivy-competitive football team, being Ivy-League competitive in both women's & men's basketball is a reasonable aspiration.

[Weder]

One thing I'd expect, with considerable legitimacy, is for her to prioritize bringing women's sports up to substantive (quality) rather than formal (financial) parity with men's sports. This is already true in ice hockey, but I'm not aware of anything similar in our other more successful men's sports (lax, wrestling, etc.) Of course, other sports might be viable alternatives, which is why Cornellians might have to learn that ice hockey is one of two forms of hockey played at the intercollegiate level.

Lacrosse and basketball are obvious candidates.

Women's lacrosse definitely has the potential to be a very strong program and reached the final four in 2002. More recently, they had a nice run of NCAA tournament appearances a few years back. The number of women's lacrosse programs is far higher than the number of men's, and the Ivies have remained relatively strong. Basketball is tougher, but Princeton has shown it's possible to build a nationally relevant program. I feel like the women's rowing team should be stronger, though the balance of power in women's crew has really shifted away from the Ivies and to the big state schools.

I wouldn't expect women's basketball to be nationally relevant anymore than I'd expect this of men's basketball. In this century Sweet 16 appearances occur perhaps once per decade, if only we should be so lucky.

But just as we'd be satisfied with an Ivy-competitive football team, being Ivy-League competitive in both women's & men's basketball is a reasonable aspiration.

I should add that it'd be nice to see women's track and cross-country get back to the point they were at a decade or so ago when they were sending a fair number of individual qualifiers to the national championships and in the mix for a team berth. Women's fencing seems to be on the rise, but the Ivy League is tough.

[mountainred]

One thing I'd expect, with considerable legitimacy, is for her to prioritize bringing women's sports up to substantive (quality) rather than formal (financial) parity with men's sports. This is already true in ice hockey, but I'm not aware of anything similar in our other more successful men's sports (lax, wrestling, etc.) Of course, other sports might be viable alternatives, which is why Cornellians might have to learn that ice hockey is one of two forms of hockey played at the intercollegiate level.

Lacrosse and basketball are obvious candidates.

Women's lacrosse definitely has the potential to be a very strong program and reached the final four in 2002. More recently, they had a nice run of NCAA tournament appearances a few years back. The number of women's lacrosse programs is far higher than the number of men's, and the Ivies have remained relatively strong. Basketball is tougher, but Princeton has shown it's possible to build a nationally relevant program. I feel like the women's rowing team should be stronger, though the balance of power in women's crew has really shifted away from the Ivies and to the big state schools.

I wouldn't expect women's basketball to be nationally relevant anymore than I'd expect this of men's basketball. In this century Sweet 16 appearances occur perhaps once per decade, if only we should be so lucky.

But just as we'd be satisfied with an Ivy-competitive football team, being Ivy-League competitive in both women's & men's basketball is a reasonable aspiration.

If only indeed.  Our guys in 2010 are the only mens's hoops team to make the Sweet 16 since Penn made the Final Four in '79.  I'm not sure any women's team has pulled it off since 2000, but I don't think so.  As you say, Princeton is current gold standard for Ivy Women's hoops -- seriously they are very good -- and they've only won their first round game twice.