2024 NCAA Championship Session I Thread

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[SurgeOne]

objective -- I'm not so sure about that
easy to listen to -- for sure

I like Jeff, and chat with him any time I attend a PSU match. He's a good PBP announcer, and certainly makes the matches entertaining. His comments about refs, or things that should be called, are, as I've said in the past, frequently inaccurate, so that's why I don't give him a check mark on being objective. To a large extent, I think that if you've never been a wrestling ref, it's hard to analyze what should or should not be called.

I think he fully tries to be fair and objective. Agree to disagree.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[BW Lion]

Here are the match-ups for tonight's action. Numbers in brackets are the wrestler's original seed.

Penn State should be able to rack up some points tonight. I also noticed that there are 3 Nebraska vs Michigan match-ups in tonight's Championship round (141, 157, 184).

Championship Round
125#: Davis, PSU(1) vs. Unger, Cornell (17)
141#: Bartlett, PSU 2) vs. Moore, Rutgres (15)
157#: Haines, PSU (1) vs. Travis, OK State (16)
165# Messenbrink, PSU (2) vs. Castella, Binghamton (15)
174# Starocci, PSU (9) vs. Kemp, Cal Poly (8)
184#: Truax, PSU (6) vs. Hawks, Missouri (11)
197# Brooks, PSU (1) vs. Novak, Wyoming (17)
285# Kirkvilet, PSU (1) vs. Griess, Navy (17)

Consolations
133#: Nagao, PSU (10) vs. Moore, Missouri (26)
149# Kasak, PSU (7) vs. Roberts, Minnesota (23)

 

[bohucon]

The amount of commercials on ESPN is absolutely insane. You get maybe half of a period of a match and they go to commercial. It's almost not worth it to air it like this.

Agree Jeez it's 2 minutes of wrestling and 3 minutes of commercials

 

[BigBankFrank]

Thoughts on session 1:

It seems to be a down session. The start wasn't what we hoped for with Nagao's loss, Beau's struggles, then Kasak's loss. Overall though, it wasn't that bad. Heard a rumor of Nagao being badly sick. Could explain it if true. Kasak is fine, should be able to make a run although his second match in consolations (I believe tomorrow morning) will be tough. This is how Beau wrestles so not too concerning at this point. Haines, Mesenbrink, Truax, Brooks, and Kerk all looked good. Davis wrestled a tough guy in Lujan, as long as the finger is ok, he's fine. Starocci seemed a little tentative, understandably, but I think he looked healthy enough to win it. We'll find out tomorrow morning assuming he wins tonight.

170 was always going to be tough, maybe a little moreso after this session, but it's still within reach.

Nagao looked sick or struggled with the weight cut because he looked completely overpowered. I will say the kid he wrestled was as long and lanky of 133 pounder I’ve ever seen. His reach looked like 197 pounder.

Beau always wrestles close matches. Dude has so much talent and won’t let it fly.

Starocci definitely isn’t 100%. You can’t rule the warrior out from winning it all, but after watching the match with Sparks, I’m a little skeptical. Lewis is a beast when healthy and just might be too much on 1 leg.

Nagao, Beau and Kasak all struggled to finish shots. Thought everyone else wrestled well. Really impressed with how Bernie looked.

 

[gimb14]

Nagao looked sick or struggled with the weight cut because he looked completely overpowered. I will say the kid he wrestled was as long and lanky of 133 pounder I’ve ever seen. His reach looked like 197 pounder.

I'm going with badly sick. His reaction times were off and had nothing for him. His next two matches are still winnable, but we're gonna need to see improvement

 

[WV lion]

You can get team scores and brackets on trackwrestling

 

[LB99]

Nagao looked sick or struggled with the weight cut because he looked completely overpowered. I will say the kid he wrestled was as long and lanky of 133 pounder I’ve ever seen. His reach looked like 197 pounder.

Beau always wrestles close matches. Dude has so much talent and won’t let it fly.

Starocci definitely isn’t 100%. You can’t rule the warrior out from winning it all, but after watching the match with Sparks, I’m a little skeptical. Lewis is a beast when healthy and just might be too much on 1 leg.

Nagao, Beau and Kasak all struggled to finish shots. Thought everyone else wrestled well. Really impressed with how Bernie looked.

To be completely fair, Abas is not your average 26 seed at 149. He’s a redshirt senior, former All-American, his father is a former multiple time All-American and his uncle won a silver medal in the Olympics. Kasak is a true freshman wrestling up a weight. Sure, Tyler could have opened it up a bit more, but give Abas some credit. He’s pretty good. Seeds sometimes don’t really tell the whole story. Kasak will be fine. He’s got less than 20 career college matches under his belt.

 

[ScottL]

You need to select the weight class on the left side of the page

https://www.trackwrestling.com/predefinedtournaments/MainFrame.jsp?newSession=false&TIM=1711048053725&pageName=%2Fpredefinedtournaments%2FBracketViewer.jsp&twSessionId=brmrlzbxvs

Thanks!

 

[GregPickel]

Update on Soldano:

 

[JBott]

Update on Soldano:

Thank God! Hopefully he will be fine!

 

[PSU_Lions_84]

Update on Soldano:

Hope Soldano continues to improve!

 

[truth-and-reason]

Plenty of people who have never reffed are capable of analyzing what should or should not be called. Everyone from former wrestlers to coaches and even pbp announcers. Heck, there are plenty of refs that are terrible at it.

there might be "plenty" that are capable of analyzing accurately but speaking from years of experience it is a "minority". There are a so many illegal holds and nuances to situations that even those who wrestled or coached will get it wrong. I am by no means claiming all refs get it right 100% of the time. Far from it actually. It is really, really, really hard to ref an entire meet and be in the ideal position every single time to make every call correctly. That said, the majority of the refs I worked with over the years who were good enough to ref post-season in high school or higher, had an understanding the rules that was often much greater than 95% of the fans/coaches/wrestlers.

 

[BVSt.Paul]

The base line membership is $100.

You can get in the door for $35.

 

[truth-and-reason]

@133 - kid was ready to wrestle. It looked like he scouted Nagao extensively, had a well constructed plan of attack and executed it perfectly. Opponent was prepared and think he out-wrestled Nagao. Question now is how Nagao looks in the next match where advance scouting/prep probably is very unlikely to be a difference maker.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[hohmadw1978]

You can get in the door for $35. View attachment 544301

True but most members make a donation which helps pay scholarships for the wrestlers.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

ouch

 

[gimb14]

@133 - kid was ready to wrestle. It looked like he scouted Nagao extensively, had a well constructed plan of attack and executed it perfectly. Opponent was prepared and think he out-wrestled Nagao. Question now is how Nagao looks in the next match where advance scouting/prep probably is very unlikely to be a difference maker.

really starting to believe this isn't it. Don't wanna discount it, but Nagao isn't right.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

crazy bottom of the 141 bracket:

#26 seed Vance Vombaur (Minny) defeated #7 Cael Happel (UNI), 8-5, SV-1

#23 Danny Fongaro (Indy) defeated #10 Tagen Jamison (Okla. St.), 9-8

As a result, Vombaur takes on Fongaro tonight, with the winner meeting in the Quarters the winner of tonight's #2 Beau Bartlett vs. #15 Mitch Moore (Rutgers) match

If you look at the Consolation bracket based on the above, tonight in R1, #7 Cael Happel (UNI) will face #10 Tagen Jamison (Okla. St.). So one of them (the #7 or the 10) will have their tournament end tonight. I doubt anybody would have predicted that.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

Wow, I missed this @ 184. Congrats for James Conway and for Franklin & Marshall.

 

[Adler01]

Nagao looked sick or struggled with the weight cut because he looked completely overpowered. I will say the kid he wrestled was as long and lanky of 133 pounder I’ve ever seen. His reach looked like 197 pounder.

Beau always wrestles close matches. Dude has so much talent and won’t let it fly.

Starocci definitely isn’t 100%. You can’t rule the warrior out from winning it all, but after watching the match with Sparks, I’m a little skeptical. Lewis is a beast when healthy and just might be too much on 1 leg.

Nagao, Beau and Kasak all struggled to finish shots. Thought everyone else wrestled well. Really impressed with how Bernie looked.

Carter and our guys need to focus on this round only. Davis has a hurt hand and Carter has the 8 seed. Aaron being sick gotta try to gut it out. Gonna be exciting

 

[Tom McAndrew]

I think if I was the Campbell coach, or a member of the Campbell contingent, I'd be pissed if this is accurate. Seems hard to believe on purely random selection. Apparently they select, at random, 3 wrestlers at each weight class.

 

[GregPickel]

 

[Adler01]

@133 - kid was ready to wrestle. It looked like he scouted Nagao extensively, had a well constructed plan of attack and executed it perfectly. Opponent was prepared and think he out-wrestled Nagao. Question now is how Nagao looks in the next match where advance scouting/prep probably is very unlikely to be a difference maker.

Aaron MUST get better on his feet. That kid did his homework.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

down goes Glazer

in OT, to Smith from VT

 

[razpsu]

Both wrestlers had two weeks to prepare. UVA guy prepared better. As you can see at 141 you better be ready out of the gate. All of these guys are state champions for goodness sake and they have been used to winning for the most part .

 

[Got GSPs]

Solid performance by Braden.

What was the referee saying to him at the end, while raising his hand? Maybe shake hands and then worry about headgear?

 

[gpsu88]