Penn State wrestling lands top 2024 recruit Zack Ryder
A new commitment is in for Penn State wrestling. The Lions locked up a pledge from New York Class of 2024 standout Zack Ryder on Friday.
Ryder has tore through Empire State and national, and even international competition at the prep level. The Westtown, N.Y., Minisink Valley grappler is already a two-time state champ. He won last year’s top spot in the 160-pound bracket and finished the season 45-1. He also won the U17 U.S Cadet freestyle tournament at 80 kilograms (176 pounds) earlier this year in Las Vegas. That qualified him for worlds, where he won a bronze medal in July.
“It’s really incredible,” Minisink Valley coach Kevin Gallagher told Record Online.
“When you sit back and you think about that he won a bronze medal in the World Championships — the world. Out of the whole world, he’s the third best guy in his weight class in the world. That’s pretty, really incredible when you think about that. Not Section 9, not New York state, not even the country, it is just really incredible when you think about it.”
Added Ryder:
“It means a lot that all of my wrestling and hard work that I put in went to use. I’m not too happy about bronze, some people would love to get that, but I wanted the gold and I’ll get it next year.”
Ryder also won a Fargo freestyle title in 2021.
More on Zack Ryder, Penn State recruiting
Entering his junior year, Ryder is ranked as the No. 7 pound-for-pound wrestler in the country at 182 pounds by FloWrestling. He is No. 2 nationally in that weight class by the same outlet and the top ranked junior. The long and short of it is this: Penn State has landed one of the nation’s top wrestlers in the next recruiting cycle.
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Ryder projects as an upperweight at the next level. Where he ends up specially though will be determined later as he continues to grow.
Penn State has now landed two commitments in September. The other came from Class of 2023 upperweight amd multi-time New Jersey placer AJ Fricchione.
“Penn State has been my dream school growing up as a kid, my father and I would always watch all the great wrestlers who came through Penn State,” Fricchione told BWI.
“I always thought to myself I hope that can be me one day. When I visited Penn State something really stood out to me, and it was that every single person in that wrestling room had a smile on there face. Everyone who is there loves to wrestle, those are the guys I want to surround myself around.”
