After ending Session 3 on a high note, the bottom fell out of the Buckeyes' dreams of a repeat NCAA championship with a surprisingly bad start on Friday night.
Despite several early disappointing losses, No. 11-seeded Myles Martin earned a trip to the championship bout at 174 pounds and Kyle Snyder set up a clash of titans at heavyweight with his methodical victory.
Nathan Tomasello advanced to the semifinals to set up a huge match against his Iowa nemesis Thomas Gilman with a nice 10-4 victory over Dylan Peters of Northern Iowa in the quarterfinals. Tomasello fell to 1-2 in the last two seasons against Gilman when the Hawkeye pinned Tomasello in the sudden victory period. Tomasello pushed the pace throughout the match, but Gilman stayed calm and fended off the Buckeye’s attacks.
Tomasello nearly earned a takedown at the end of regulation, but time ran out a second before he completed the takedown, sending the match to sudden victory overtime.
Gilman appeared to be the fresher of the two wrestlers and capitalized, scoring a takedown and subsequent pin (which seemed like it wasn’t really a pin, but that’s water under the bridge) in the sudden victory. Gilman, who is the No. 4 seed, will wrestle No. 3 seed Nico Megaludis of Penn State in Saturday night’s finals. Tomasello will wrestle in the wrestleback semifinals against Michigan’s Conor Youtsey on Saturday morning to advance to the placement matches.
At 133 pounds, senior Johnni DiJulius fell for the second time in the tournament to end his career for the Buckeyes. DiJulius fell to Eric Montoya of Nebraska on Thursday night and lost a 13-8 decision to Air Force’s Josh Martinez to be bounced from the tournament. DiJulius ends his career as the winningest wrestler currently on the team, notching his 100th win as a Buckeye earlier in the season. In the semifinals at 133, top-seeded Nahshon Garrett (Cornell) pinned defending NCAA champ Cody Brewer (Oklahoma) in 21 seconds to advance to the finals, where he will meet Iowa’s #2 seed Cory Clark. Clark defeated No. 3 Zane Richards of Illinois with a last-second takedown.
Micah Jordan made his way to the quarterfinals, but lost a last-second decision to #14 Bryce Meredith of Wyoming. Meredith scrambled late after Jordan had a late takedown and earned a reversal and locked up a cradle to earn the decisive bonus points. Micah dropped to the bloodround, where he lost to Lehigh’s #16 Randy Cruz in a surprisingly one-sided 6-2 decision.
Cruz scored backpoints despite giving up a takedown early to Jordan. Micah was unable to escape from the bottom position, which has been an alarming trend throughout the tournament for a number of Buckeyes. Micah ends his freshman season without All-American honors. Meredith ended up defeating #2 Joey McKenna of Stanford to punch his ticket to Saturday night’s finals. Meredith will meet Oklahoma State’s Dean Heil, who is a St. Edward High School graduate. Heil defeated Anthony Ashnault of Rutgers in the semifinals.
At 149 pounds, the top two seeds will meet in the finals as No. 1 Zain Retherford of Penn State will meet No. 2 Brandon Sorensen of Iowa. The two met in the Big Ten championship bout with Retherford staying undefeated this season.
Jake Ryan was eliminated on Thursday night at 157 pounds, but wrestling fans everywhere were treated to a pair of exciting semifinal bouts on Friday night. Top-seeded and defending NCAA champion Isaiah Martinez was given everything he could handle by #4 Ian Miller of Kent State. IMar scored a takedown in sudden victory against the hobbled Miller to set up a rematch against #3 seed Jason Nolf of Penn State.
Bo Jordan earned a trip to the semifinals on Friday with a one-sided victory over Illinois’ Steven Rodrigues, but Bo took just his third loss of the season in the semifinals. Each of Bo’s losses this season have been at the hands of his cousin, Isaac Jordan, the latest coming by a 5-4 decision. Bo looked the best that he has all season against Isaac, but Isaac had a nice reversal that made the difference. Bo will wrestle in the Virginia Tech’s David McFadden in the consolation semifinals on Saturday morning to place in the top six at 165.
Myles Martin earned his first trip to the NCAA finals with an outstanding Day 2. Admittedly, Martin was aided by some upsets, but his top wrestling looked incredible all weekend. Martin used that top game to score a 2-0 victory in the quarterfinals over Matt Reed of Oklahoma before an impressive 8-2 decision over Lelund Weatherspoon of Iowa State in the semifinals. Martin’s takedowns were the difference, setting up a fourth match this season against top-seeded Bo Nickal of Penn State. Nickal has won all four, but the first two were very close.
Kenny Courts was eliminated at 184 pounds on Thursday night, but top-seeded Gabe Dean gave Cornell their second finalist of the tournament with a big win over Pete Renda of NC State. Dean will look for a second straight national title against TJ Dudley of Nebraska, who defeated Willie Miklus of Missouri in the semis.
The top two seeds at 197 pounds will meet in the finals as No. 1 Morgan McIntosh (Penn State) and No. 2 J’Den Cox (Missouri) won their semifinal bouts in convincing fashion.
Kyle Snyder advanced to his second consecutive NCAA championships on Friday night with a pair of impressive victories. He dominated Ameer Dhesi of Oregon State in the quarterfinals before downing No. 3 seed Ty Walz of Virginia Tech in the semifinals by the score of 10-6. Snyder will face No. 1 seed Nick Gwiazdowski of NC State, who is riding an 89 match winning streak and has won the last two NCAA Championships at heavyweight. With any luck, we’ll get to close the finals on Saturday night with Snyder versus Gwiz.
At the conclusion of the second day, the Buckeyes sit in fifth place with 68 points. Virginia Tech has 69.5, Iowa has 77.5, Oklahoma State has 79.5, and Penn State leads the field with an impressive 114.
The action begins on Saturday at 11 AM with the consolation semifinals, followed by the 3rd, 5th, and 7th place matches on ESPNU. The championship matches will air live on ESPN on Saturday night at 8 PM.
