Did Penn State wrestler Carter Starocci earn an at-large bid for the 2024 NCAA Championships?
Penn State 174-pound standout Carter Starocci is officially headed to his fourth NCAA Wrestling Championships. The senior from Erie, Pa., earned an at-large bid from the selection committee on Tuesday. He needed one to qualify for nationals after forfeiting both of his matches at Big Tens last weekend due to injury. The Nittany Lion is one of 47 wrestlers who are now off to Kansas City, Mo., next week via the at-large invitation process. The rest of the field is made up of wrestlers who qualified for the event via their respective conference tournaments.
Starocci is a three-time NCAA champion and All-American. He hurt his knee at the end of his technical fall win over Brody Evans of Edinboro a few weeks ago. While it was unclear what the plan would be for the conference tournament heading into last weekend, it quickly became clear. Starocci spent one second on the mat before forfeiting his quarterfinal round bout for medical reasons and then did the same in his first consolation bracket match, which ended his tournament.
“I just said, ‘hey, man, just trust me. We need you in two weeks,” Lions coach Cael Sanderson told PennLive. “He’s just pretty upset…really upset, actually. But I think there’s just no reason when he meets the criteria to get an at-large to put himself in a position to set himself back. It just didn’t make sense. He’s not happy with me but that’s why he’s Carter.”
Penn State star Starocci won’t be a top seed at nationals
Starocci was clearly upset that he could not compete. He sent a cryptic tweet early Sunday morning that thanked Penn State and said that he was “looking forward to a new chapter.” That casted some doubts over whether he’d compete at NCAAs if invited. But, Monday afternoon, he made his intentions clear by tweeting: “Big ten title is cool but NCAA title is cooler. Next chapter: Kansas City.”
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Added Sanderson, to PennLive:
“He’s having a hard time with it because he’s just a competitor and he’d wrestle with both his legs hurt. We’d love to have his points, we’d love to have him go win the Big Ten but the risk…it’s not responsible for us to do it even though he obviously wanted to.”
Starocci is the No. 1 ranked wrestler at 174 pounds by InterMat. But, he won’t be the No. 1 seed at nationals. The formula used to help set the bracket includes three components: win percentage, coaches’ rank, and RPI ranking. Starocci’s pair of defeats at Big Ten, when paired with just 11 wins before his first two defeats of the year, hurt him in the first category. Thus, it will knock him down a few spots. He should end up somewhere between Nos. 3 and 6. We’ll find out tomorrow.
The seeds and full brackets for each weight class will be announced Wednesday night at 8 p.m. ET on NCAA.com.
