‘We need you in two weeks’: Penn State coach Carl Sanderson talks Carter Starocci injury default
Penn State wrestler Carter Starocci wrestled two seconds at the Big Ten Championships. That’s all he had to do to qualify for nationals. But, it ended his win streak. The three-time NCAA champion injury defaulted twice out of his conference tournament matches after suffering a knee injury at the end of his match against Edinboro three Sundays ago.
“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.”
“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 will need an at-large bid to qualify for the NCAA Tournament. He is guaranteed to get it. And end up as the Nos. 3-6 seed.
Big Ten tournament schedule
Maryland is hosting the two-day event. The schedule is as follows (all times eastern)
Sunday
Noon – Session 4 (Consolation Semifinals, 7th-Place Matches)
4:30 p.m. – Session 5 (1st-, 3rd- and 5th- Place Matches)
How to follow Penn State wrestling at the Big Ten tournament
The Big Ten tournament will be a mixture of live television coverage and streaming. Penn State matches will be part of Big Ten Network’s over-the-air coverage of sessions one, three, and five. BTN+ will stream matside coverage for all sessions. It is also the exclusive home to watch sessions two and four.
The Penn State Sports Network will be on the air with the prematch show at 9:45 p.m. Longtime broadcaster Jeff Byers will be on the call. ET. Click here to access the free LionVision feed.
You can also follow along live and chat with other Penn State wrestling fans on Blue-White Illustrated’s The Wrestling Room forum. Access it by clicking here for live updates.
