Spencer Lee advances to Gold Medal match
It was an early (and later) morning that couldn’t have gone much better if you’re an Iowa wrestling fan – which is nice and all, but more importantly it couldn’t have gone much better if you’re 2024 Olympian Spencer Lee competing in Paris seven hours ahead of the good folks back in the Midwest.
The Hawkeye legend made his long-awaited Olympic debut and boy did he make it count on Day 1 of the Men’s Freestyle 57-kilogram competition.
After starting Thursday four wins away from standing atop the podium with a gold medal around his neck, that magic number is now down to just one.
Lee took out the #6 seed from China, an unseeded opponent from Kyrgyzstan and the #7 seed from Uzbekistan within the span of about six-and-a-half hours to advance to the final – where he’ll meet #1 seed and 2016 Olympic silver medalist Rei Higuchi of Japan around noon central time tomorrow (August 9th).
I’ll be giving you the rundown of how it all transpired, as well as a peek at the awesome collision set to take place in Friday’s gold medal match.
Round 1: #6 Wanhao Zou (China) – 3-2 decision
As I touched on in my preview for Spencer Lee and his potential path at 57 kilograms, this was a rematch between these two wrestlers from back in May at the Last Chance Olympic qualifier – a 10-9 victory for Lee in Istanbul, Turkey.
And much like that previous meeting, this was another that wound up having a deceptive one-point final margin.
https://youtu.be/BqET-xp0LIE?si=IG6TTFN8cF0l_af6
Whereas three months ago Zao seemed to surprise Lee with a couple of explosive early shots before the Hawkeye quickly stormed back from a 6-2 deficit, this go around there were no such early attacks from the Chinese wrestler.
In fact, there wasn’t much of an attempt made by Zao to generate any of his own offense until quite literally the last seven or eight seconds of the match, trailing 3-0.
For pretty much the rest of the action the American was overwhelmingly the aggressor – even looking to add to his lead in the final 30 seconds with a deep shot that nearly garnered him a step out point on the edge of the mat.
The strategy by the Chinese competitor was crystal clear:
Try to avoid wrestling exchanges at all costs and hope to sneak out a match-winning score in the dying moments.
Even though Lee appeared visibly perturbed walking off the mat – presumably due to the bout’s lack of scoring and excitement that have been his trademark for years – any sort of win at the Olympics is a good one.
An early single leg finish for two plus an additional shot clock point established early breathing room (and was nearly even bigger had Lee not run out of room going for a turn on the edge). From there, as previously mentioned Zao did little to trouble the Hawkeye other than a last-ditch sprint which earned him two meaningless step-out points just before the final horn sounded.
In the clearly audible post-match words of Iowa head coach Tom Brands – cornering for Lee in Paris – “He (Zao) had nothing for you.”
Truer words have rarely been spoken, and Lee advanced into the quarterfinals to be held within the hour.
Quarterfinal: (unseeded) Bekzat Almaz Uulu (Kyrgyzstan) – 12-2 technical fall
I could probably save us all a lot of time and distill Lee’s quarterfinal match down to this hilarious, yet totally applicable GIF that emerged in the immediate aftermath of the 12-2 shellacking of his opponent from Kyrgyzstan:
To go into a bit further detail though, it didn’t take long for Almaz Uulu to realize that his upset victory over the #3 seed a few minutes earlier had done very little to prepare him for what Spencer Lee was bringing to the table.The back-to-back U23 World bronze medalist actually scored the first points of the match when he narrowly evaded a nice shot from Lee and was able to quickly counter for the easy takedown.That 2-0 lead proved to be about as short-lived as one can be as Lee attacked immediately off the restart for a takedown and a turn to regain control.Another takedown-to-turn transition – this one capped with a high leg lace – made the score 8-2. The Hawkeye would ‘slam the door shut’ soon after, coincidentally by nearly slamming Almaz Uulu’s face through the mat on a heavy snap-down before hitting a four-point go-behind that took the Kyrgyzstani feet to back for the first-period tech. fall.
Semifinal: #7 Gulomjon Abdullaev (Uzbekistan) – 14-4 technical fall
Lee’s final match of the day was kind of the epitome of what I think a lot of us have come to know him as – routinely dominant, yet often in the most spectacular fashion.
His semifinal opponent – Gulomjon Abdullaev – entered Paris off of three-consecutive seventh-place finishes on the World/Olympic stage dating back to Tokyo 2021.
It took a little over a minute, but Lee finally finished a single leg to open the scoring.
Shortly after that he’d counter a double-unders throw attempt by the 7th-seeded Uzbekistani for a 4-0 lead, and then the fireworks really began.
Now in the top position, Lee went to work in par terre with a pair of gut wrenches to put himself on the verge of earning a technical fall.
He then went looking for an Alex Marinelli-eque ‘cowcatcher’ to ice the match and was initially awarded four points for the maneuver.
However, a challenge from the opposing corner showed that Abdullaev had slyly initiated a counter of his own during the sequence, and video review would ultimately decide to score things four points to Abdullaev and two to Lee for a 10-4 margin.
Undeterred, the 25-year-old Pennsylvania native would shoot in again less than 10 seconds off the restart, this time (somehow) countering another big-move attempt from Abdullaev by cartwheeling across his own head to avoid giving up points for exposure.
And if that weren’t impressive enough, he’d seamlessly flow through the sequence by securing the takedown before transitioning straight into a match-sealing gut wrench.
https://youtu.be/OQYM6Khgup4?si=wATxiJlfR4acPavM
If you didn’t see it live – or even if you did – I’d highly encourage you to go back and watch the replay in hopes of comprehending how Lee could possibly make something so incredible seem so mundane.
I know I still can’t quite understand it.
Going for gold
As I mentioned before, Lee’s opponent in the finals will undoubtedly be his toughest of the tournament.
Not only is Japan’s Rei Higuchi a prior Olympic silver medalist (2016), but he’s also been on wrestling’s biggest stage each of the past two years – winning a Senior World title at 61 kilograms in 2022 then finishing as the runner up at 57kg a year ago.
His run through this bracket can only be described as dominant.
Following an opening round victory by forfeit, Higuchi teched each of his next two opponents with relative ease, including the quarterfinal match (below) against 2017 NCAA champion Darian Cruz – formerly of Lehigh University, now wrestling for Puerto Rico:
The top seed in this tournament is both dynamic and technical, and it’ll figure to take most, if not all of Lee’s own considerable abilities in order to get the final victory that would put him atop the podium tomorrow afternoon.
How to watch
Per the original schedule, Friday’s gold medal match at 57 kilograms was set to get underway at 12:55 p.m. (CDT).
However, I’ve also seen times listed as early as 12:35, and thus would recommend that everyone tune in somewhere around 12:15 just to be safe.
Similarly, there’s a chance that tomorrow’s wrestling finals will be televised live on USA Network.
But again, so as to be better safe than sorry the only place I am certain you can catch the action in real-time is streaming on Peacock.
Look, you’re all grown adults and can make your own decisions on this.
(At least I presume you’re all adults. Maybe my audience skews a lot younger than I previously imagined?)
Point being, if you decide to tempt fate on catching the final either by cutting it close on time or trying to watch via the traditional cable TV route, I will not be held responsible for whatever might transpire from there.
Short time
Folks, this is it.
This is the one many of you have been waiting for ever since getting your first tantalizing peek at what all could be possible in the career of Spencer Lee.
Whatever winds up happening tomorrow just enjoy the fact that this all-time great Hawkeye has already accomplished yet another spectacular feat on the wrestling mat – and once again we’ve all had the great fortune of simply being here to witness it.
But sure, I guess as long as we’re here why not go ahead and finish the damn thing with a gold medal?
I certainly wouldn’t say no to that, and I don’t believe Spencer Lee will tomorrow either.
