Penn State wrestling schedule: Who will the Lions face at home and on the road during the 2023-2024 Big Ten season?
The complete Penn State wrestling schedule for the 2023-2024 season will not be released with dates until September. But, as of Thursday, we know which Big Ten Conference foes the Lions will face thanks to both releases from other schools and the process of elimination as they aim to defend the league and NCAA titles they won a year ago.
Head coach Cael Sanderson’s team will take on Rutgers, Nebraska, Indiana, and Ohio State at home. It’s unclear how many dual meets will occur at Rec Hall compared to the Bryce Jordan Center. Last year, the latter venue hosted a pair of matches, which is something that intrigued the longtime leader of the Lions.
“[Wrestling at the BJC] gives new opportunities for fans to see the team, and we want to continue to build our fan base,” Sanderson said. “And it’s hard to do that if people can’t get in to watch your matches. We want to make sure we have a big match over there and let as many people fit in there to come watch a match, and hopefully, from there you can hook them and make them wrestling fans and Penn State wrestling fans.”
Penn State will face Iowa, Michigan, Maryland, and Michigan State on the road.
Dates for the Big Ten matches, plus the full non-conference schedule, will be revealed later this year. In recent years, the team has participated in at least one tournament and also faced non-Big Ten teams in November and to close out the regular season in February.
Penn State 2023-2024 wrestling lineup outlook
Penn State will be favored to win the Big Ten and NCAA Tournaments again this year. The Lions lost multi-time national champion Roman Bravo-Young from last year’s lineup. But, they return plenty of highly-successful wrestlers and also added some intriguing newcomers.
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Here’s the Blue-White Illustrated projected lineup for the 2023-2024 season:
125 pounds: Robbie Howard OR Gary Steen
133 pounds: Aaron Nagao
141 pounds: Beau Bartlett
149 pounds: Shayne Van Ness
157 pounds: Levi Haines OR MItchell Mesenbrink
165 pounds: Alex Facundo OR Mitchell Mesenbrink
174 pounds: Carter Starocci
184 pounds: Aaron Brooks OR Bernie Truax IV
197 pounds: Aaron Brooks OR Bernie Truax IV
285 pounds: Greg Kerkvliet
Penn State must decide if any of Mesenbrink, Starocci, or Brooks will take an Olympic redshirt season. Any or all of them doing so would cause a mixup in the projections, of course. But, they have plenty of time to make those decisions.
Nagao joins the Lions after earning All-American honors at Minnesota. Mesenbrink is a newcomer from Cal Baptist who just won the U20 Pan-AM Championship. And, Truax IV was a three-time All-American at Cal Poly.
