Solid, he had a couple really good seasons for Stanford at 197 before bumping up to 285 last year and wrestling a really short schedule. Only problem is HWT is deeper than it's been in years, so he's probably capped out as a bloodround guy.
Two of the top 3 recruits in the class of 2023 have committed! #1 Cody Chittum committed to Minnesota #3 Christian Carroll committed to Illinois Huge pickups for those programs. Gotta recruit them for 2 more years though.
Coming in next year, as in class of 2021 true freshmen? Most of the top TOP guys will probably have to redshirt. Richie Figueroa comes in at 125 for ASU where he will be behind NCAA runner up Brandon Courtney. He will probably redshirt, but they'll have to figure out a spot for him either this year or next. Drake Ayala is Spencer Lee's future replacement at 125 for Iowa and will redshirt next year. Shayne Van Ness and Alex Facundo are maybe two of the top 3 recruits in the country going to Penn State. Van Ness is likely behind Nick Lee/Beau Bartlett. Facundo will probably compete for a spot at 165 with Joe Lee. It wouldn't surprise me if he's the guy by the time NCAAs roll around, similar to Bartlett in 2021. Cael Valencia, Anthony and Zahid's bro, might redshirt at 174 for ASU. Paddy Gallagher has a very good chance to win the starting job for OSU at 157. So with that being said, the biggest names I'd look out for in '21-'22 are Alex Facundo and Paddy Gallagher. In terms of c/o 2020 guys that didn't wrestle this past season that will make a huge impact next year, Braxton Amos at Wisconsin will contend for championship at 197 as a FR. Greg Diakomihalis, Yianni's little bro, could either redshirt behind Vitali Arujao or wrestle at 133 for Cornell if he's gotten big enough. Joshua Saunders will probably start at 141 for Cornell, but he's been extreeeeemely up and down since his JR year of HS. Seems like mostly down as of late. Lachlan McNeil will probably be the guy at 149 for UNC if AOC bumps up to 157 as expected, but 149 is going to be a REALLY deep weight.
Suck? Heinselman (125), Kharchla (165), Gallagher (157), Echemendia (141), Romero (174), Sasso (149), Smith (165) That's a solid core. Not enough to top Iowa of PSU, but should be Top 5, no?
Lower AA at best, who knows with Kharchla and Gallagher, Echemendia may not even start, Romero is like a 4/5 guy at best, Sasso is awesome, Smith is Romero. When you compete with Penn State for 5 years and probably win a few more titles if Penn State isn't so fucking good, this is shit.
Pantaleo, god damn! Just beat 3x world champion Aliyev and James Green. (took two tries for him to beat green but still)
Really weird ending to Yianni D-Musukaev (again). Musukaev takes a big lead on Yianni (again) 7-1. Musukaev gasses (again) and refuses to return to center, starts getting cautions. They probably can caution him out but elect not to. Yianni is down 7-6 with 13 seconds left, Musukaev is completely done. Instead of giving him a 3rd caution they put him down in Par Terre. Yianni wants to go neutral because he's scoring at will at this point, but the ref insists on par terre. Yianni can't turn him in a gut for 13 seconds and the match ends 7-6. Musukaev takes a small nap on the mat after the match.
Nick Picc just got his first MMA win on UFC fight pass with Kyle Crutchmer in his corner. How long until they're both stars?
My shitty team USA Cadet preview, Upper weights (cliffs notes--prepare yourself for a rough day): 65kg: Meyer Shapiro is a really good wrestler with a bright future ahead of him. He gets Ukraine in rd1, don't know anything about Yusov, but I think that's very winnable for Meyer. Next he gets Russia. No bueno. Zavurbekov is one of the very best on this Russian squad. I do think Shapiro could maybe be the #2 guy at this weight class, but Russia has to be considered the favorite. I think this is a loss, but Russia should put him in repechage, where he could easily string together some wins Prediction: BRONZE 71kg: UZB in rd 1, don't know anything about him because of Asian Cadets being cancelled. If he wins he gets winner of Turkey and AZE, Turkey won Euro bronze. Then KAZ. Then probably Iran in Semis. Russia and Armenia are both on the opposite side which is a big plus here. I could see a medal for Haines to be honest, but he needs to win a lot of matches. Prediction: BRONZE 80kg Well this is exactly what you don't want to see, Russia in the first round. On the bright side, Malachdibirov is not Russia's #1 guy--Russia's Abkhazi wrestlers at 80kg and 110kg were denied visas and had to be replaced. If somehow Rowley gets past Russia, he gets the winner of Iran and Ukraine. Iran is always solid and Ukraine won Euro gold... Prediction: No medal 92kg: UAE rd 1 which should be a win for Gavin. Don't know much about Yarahmadi because there was no cadet asian championships this year with covid. But if he's Peyman's brother that's pretty good pedigree. If he beats Iran, he gets Russia, and Russia is good and likely the favorite to win gold. Tough draw, but I do think Gavin has a chance to make it through the heavy hitters. He's really good. Prediction: No medal 110 Mullen gets Sahil of India, who had to pull out some heroics to become India's rep. If he beats him, he gets Lagvilava of France. His run to gold likely ends there, Lagvilava is an absolute beast and maybe the best French wrestler in the last 50 years. He teched Russia fairly dominantly to win Euro gold. On the bottom half Turkey and Russia are the major threats, although this is Russia's #2--their #1 was denied a visa here as well. Guessing Lagvilava over Buyukcingil, both are outstanding wrestlers. USA Prediction: No medal (but solid chance at bronze)
Lower weights (short on time so this will be abridged) 45kg: Bo Bassett, the young phenom! He gets Georgia in RD1, which is never a walkover, then a really tough match against Euro Silver Armenia as well in rd 2. If he makes it past those guys, he probably gets KAZ or UKR in the semis. Russia and Iran are on the opposite ends of the bracket Prediction: Gold medal 48kg: Lilledahl gets Russia in rd1. I think that is winnable, actually, but you never want to see a Dagestani lining up across from you for your first match in an international tournament. If he gets past Russia, he gets KGZ, who also a beast. Then Iran is waiting in semis. Brutal draw. If this kid wins a medal, he earned it. Prediction: No medal. 51kg: Jesuroga gets Turkey rd 1, then UZB rd 2. Don't know anything about them. I think he can win both, but Turkey could be really tough. Russia in semis (rd 3) could be the end of his run to gold. Kid is good. But Jesuroga is really good as well. Prediction: Bronze 55kg: Moore gets Armenia in RD1. That's a loss. Good news here is that most of the other heavy hitters are on the opposite side of the bracket. Could be in a situation here where Moore can make a run through repechage, but he's going to have to string together a bunch of wins there assuming he loses RD1. AZE could be a threat, don't know him at all. Prediction: No medal. 60kg: Mantanona has Azerbaijan in RD 1, that's probably a loss. Russia is on the same half of the bracket and the Russian is really good. Russia gets Iran in 1st rd. Prediction: No medal. Basically this is going to be a rough week of wrestling for team usa.
Lilledahl beats Russia 9-9 in rd 1 BUT somehow the match score is showing 10-8 for Russia with some phantom points, and USA loses. USA challenges and after at least 5 minutes of sorting out the points the challenge is miraculously UPHELD and USA wins!
Well, never seen this one before. Half way through the Iran-Uzbekistan 65kg match, with Iran up 2-1, it is discovered that Iran had sent the wrong wrestler to the mat, their 55kg was wrestling at 65kg for almost 2 minutes and winning. Lots of confusion right now as to how to handle this
They just restarted the match! seems kind of unfair that UZB doesn't even get to collect himself for a few minutes.
Jimmy Mullen just got a break against India. Was up 8-1, gassed pretty hard, India comes back to tie it 8-8, he thinks he's winning on criteria when Mullen is actually winning, and time runs out. Mullen moves on.
Rowley comes back from a 2-6 deficit and beats Russia 10-6 after a big challenge win! Could not be a better start for Team USA, two head to head Russia wins, even though it was two of the more winnable ones.
Moore does indeed lose to Armenia, 6-0, in a competitive match. Just couldn't score on him, was 2-0 at the end.
Shapiro-Zavurbekov QF match is really, really close. Shapiro is up 7-6 with 0:00 on the scoreboard but this will go to a challenge. Russia might have exposed at the end. Very close, outstanding match, could have easily been a gold medal match.
Russia loses the challenge! Meyer Shapiro defeats Zavurbekov, one of Russia's studs. USA 3-0 on the day against Russia.
And Rowley takes out Euro Gold Medalist Mamrosh of UKR! Things are shaping up very, very nicely here.
It really couldn't have. We lost the one where we were likely going to lose, won all the ones we were supposed to win, and won all the toss-ups. In addition we got some major help when the favorite in the 110kg bracket, France, did something silly and basically 4'ed himself in a 2-2 match he was winning against Hungary. Mullen went on to beat Hungary handily. I don't think he would have beaten France. Mullen and Rowley should now be favorites to win their semis matches. Shapiro has an azeri that looked solid but he still is the guy to beat at this point imo. Lilledahl has a kid from KAZ that looked like Spencer Lee in pinning Iran in under a minute, so a little worried about that one, but tough to tell how good a kid is in only 30 seconds or whatever it was.
wow great comeback for Lilledahl down 3-0 with a minute left comes back with two very solid TDs to win 4-3.
That Kazakh looked really good as well. Lilledahl gets India for gold, he looks outstanding as well with a nasty lace, but he seems small for 48kg.
Meyer Shapiro just wrecked the Azeri 10-0 in the 1st. He gets Georgia for gold where he should be a heavy favorite.
If you asked me heading into this event, Bassett and Shapiro were the top two guys on the team. Shapiro is even better than I thought. What a stud.
Rowley beats Italy 10-0, gets up and celebrates after match is over, but Italy challenges, and it looks like they have an argument. I see 8-0 still personally, which is a shame, because Rowley could have gotten another 2 easily from that position.
Italy wins the challenge and they call it 9-2, but Rowley gets 3 quick points for the 12-2 tech. He should be the favorite over India.
Mullen beats the Kazakh 7-1 to advance to the finals against Iran. Four Americans going for gold, just one Russian!
Mantanona, Jesuroga, and Haines all lost. Basset 2-0. Gavin Nelson 1-0 with a pin in 20 seconds. I thought Haines got screwed, personally. Should have had a 1 in the last 10 seconds but I think they ruled his opponent grounded somehow? Not sure.
Obviously we want Team USA to win the team title, but it's completely awesome for wrestling that India is currently leading the points race. Edit: nevermind, they just overturned a call in Russia-India and gave RUS the win.
Gavin Nelson match against Russia is huge for the team race. If Russia wins it's a double whammy, it pulls India back into repechage.