Jason Bryant’s College Wrestling Wrap Sheet is a look at five topics from the world of college wrestling with highlights, things you know and things you don’t. Here’s the five for November 14, 2021.
Ranked Duals in the Division I world
Three ranked teams were in action in duals on Sunday and none of them were close. Missouri is now 2-0 in its return to the Big 12 after smashing visiting Northern Colorado 38-3. Northern Colorado’s lone win was also the dual’s best as 14th-ranked Andrew Alirez beat seventh-ranked Allan Hart 3-1 in sudden victory at 141 pounds. The first four bouts of the dual were all decisions, but the Tigers flexed hard with six bonus victories from 149 through heavyweight, highlighted by falls from Keegan O’Toole at 165 and Rocky Elam at 197. … Fourth-ranked Michigan had little trouble with visiting CSU Bakersfield at Cliff Keen Arena. The Wolverines prevailed 39-3 with six bonus victories including All-American Patrick Brucki’s fall over returning NCAA qualifier Josh Loomer at 2:21. The Roadrunners’ lone victory came at 141 pounds as NCAA qualifier Angelo Martinoni beat Patrick Nolan 10-8. … No. 20 Purdue beat Cleveland State 39-7. Cleveland State’s returning NCAA qualifiers did go 2-1, including DeAndre Nassar’s 2-1 victory over Max Lyon at 184 pounds. Tommy Penola blew open a tight match with three takedowns and a full set of nearfall points in the second period to eventually tech NCAA qualifier Ben Smith at 197. Oh, the other W for Cleveland State was Marcus Robinson’s major at 149. Purdue had seven of its eight wins come via bonus.
ASU comes in to the other ASU and doesn’t fork around
Arizona State came into Boone, North Carolina, home of Appalachian State, and came away with eight titles at the App State Open/Invitational. Wait, Open-slash-Invitational? Yup. There were two divisions, save at 125, where there was just one bracket. In the Invitational portion of the event, the Sun Devils crowned eight individual champions, highlighted by All-American transfer Kyle Parco pinning App State returning All-American Jonathan Milner in the finals at 149 pounds. Parco transferred after his previous school, a thoughtless, hatefully-led institution located in Fresno, dropped the sport. NCAA finalist Brandon Courtney got pushed by App State’s Caleb Smith. Courtney’s third-period escape helped him prevail 6-5. Other Sun Devil champions in the division included All-Americans Michael McGee at 133, Jacori Teemer at 157, Anthony Valencia at 165 and Cohlton Schultz at 285. Jesse Vasquez won at 141 pounds, while Kordell Norfleet topped App State’s Mason Fiscella in the finals at 197. Fiscella will probably always get a mention when he does well here, because his dad and uncle both helped give me my start working as a press box assistant for their semipro football team, the Peninsula Poseidons, when I was in middle school in the early 1990s. Fiscella also won two state titles for Poquoson High, my alma mater.
The Dundie Awards
The Dundie Awards first appeared on the second season of NBC’s show, The Office. The fictional (or is it) paper company, Dunder Mifflin, is based on Scranton. What’s not fictional is the 100 wins University of Scranton head wrestling coach Al Russomano has in his career. Russomano’s in his 16th year leading the Royals and his squad picked up four wins as they hosted the annual Electric City Duals. Scranton beat Lackawanna 55-0, Keystone 50-3, Alfred State 24-19 and Oneonta State 31-10. The latter three are all regional Division III foes.
Brochno Nation
The rumors haven’t quite hit the wrestling world yet, but college realignment has teams all over the place looking to backfill conference spots in the first major realignment wave since 2013. The Southland Conference, which doesn’t have any teams that currently sponsor wrestling, is looking into the Division II ranks to fill slots. This past weekend, University of the Incarnate Word, a private FCS school in San Antonio announced it was leaving the Southland to join the WAC. Having already added Texas A&M-Commerce from Division II, the chatter about Central Oklahoma being pursued isn’t exactly a secret. So keep an eye on that developing story. When it comes to wrestling, the third-ranked Bronchos, that’s with an H, just like Stanley, with a C, topped 13th-ranked Indianapolis 30-6 in Edmond, Oklahoma on Sunday. Per legendary SID Mike Kirk’s release, The Bronchos won the first six matches to take control of the dual and dropped just a pair of one-point decisions. UCO earned bonus points at three weights as 197 Dalton Abney had a first-period fall, 125 Paxton Rosen a technical fall and 133 Tanner Cole a major decision.
Cool Breese
For the last several years, Lake Erie head coach Jeff Breese has taken his teams to the Washington & Jefferson Invitational in Washington, Pennsylvania. Breese first did it as the head coach of Division III Buena Vista in Storm Lake, Iowa. Now at Lake Erie, it’s a bit closer of a trip. The Storm had three individual champions to win the team title and Breese got bragging rights in the Western Pennsylvania native’s household. See, Jeff’s dad, Jeff Sr. is an assistant coach at W&J, hence part of the reason to come out to the tournament is the younger Jeff gets to coach against older Jeff. I met the older Breese in Cedar Rapids several years ago after he’d come on staff at W&J. Even with the beard, it was like looking at younger Jeff in the future. You know comedian Mitch Hedberg famously said “every picture of you is a picture of you when you were younger. If someone said here’s a picture of me when I’m older, I’d be like, where’d you get that camera.” That’s paraphrased for content, but Lake Erie’s Corey Gamet claimed the title at 133 pounds, Nate Deboe won at 141 pounds and James Penfold won at 165 to pace the Storm. There’s GOING to be a Danger Mouse reference later this season when Penfold does something else, I just don’t want to burn it this early in the season.
