Can we just play Ohio State in everything, every week? Seems like we'd win a few national championships that way. The wrestling team continued the 2014 tradition of beating the Buckeyes by knocking off the 4th-ranked team in the country this afternoon in front of an estimated crowd of 2,700 in Cassell Colosseum. I only got to watch about half of the matches (church and a visit to grandma's definitely hampered my WatchESPN game), but Hokie wrestlers went toe to toe with some very solid competition, defeating a squad in which eight out of the ten wrestlers were ranked in the nation's top 25.
The match of the day was betwen #11 Zach Epperly of Tech and #13 Mark Martin of OSU, with OSU clinging to a 12-9 lead. After three periods of action, the score was tied 1-1. Five overtime periods later, Epperly went down, needing an escape to keep the match going. Instead, Zach got his hips out, grabbed ahold of Martin's head, and was able to secure a gigantic pin at the ridiculous time of 10:50.
The dual continued back-and-forth, with OSU regaining the lead heading into the heavyweight bout, 18-15. For the second consecutive dual, #9 Ty Walz faced off against a top-12 opponent, needing a win by at least 2 points against #11 Nick Tavanello to give Tech the victory. After an intense 7 minutes, the score was tied 3-3. During the tiebreaker period (a pair of 30-second "rideouts" following a 1-minute standing-start period), Walz scored a massive takedown after surrendering an escape and then notched an escape of his own to win, 6-4. The dual finished with VT and OSU tied 18-18, with each team having one pin (the second tiebreaker criteria). Tech edged OSU on the third criteria - total match points scored, 48 to 47 - to give them the victory over the Buckeyes by the narrowest of margins, 19-18.
The Hokies will hope to continue their run of success on Black Friday when they head to Vegas to compete at the Cliff Keen Invitational.
Comments
Thanks for the update. Good to see the Hokies taking down the Buckeyes again
only thing...
Dual =/= Duel
EDIT: Oh...
It's actually a dual meet, not a duel meet. Matchup between 2 teams.
hahaha...well if you couldn't already tell, I know nothing about wrestling
or english
It's quite alright. Words are hard sometimes (as an engineer, I feel that pain well).
Here's a quick little wrestling for dummies cheat sheet if you want to learn the basics. For team scoring, a decision (win by 1-7 points) scores 3 points, a major decision (win by 8-14) scores 4, a technical fall (up by 15 points at any time during the match) scores 5, and a pin (also called a fall) scores 6 points.
I'd strongly encourage anyone in Blacksburg to make it out for a dual or two this year. They're a lot of fun, and it's easy to get caught up in the action. And if you don't believe me, I think Whit said it quite nicely:
I agree. If you really want to enjoy it, try to go with a friend that knows wrestling and can explain what's happening. Definitely made it better for me last time I went.
Congrats on 10k legs! Also what great news, some part of me thinks this puts VT wrestling on the map! Before we were an up and coming program, I think from now on as long as we have this coach (name is slipping me right now) we will be one of the big boys on the block.
Yay, fake internet points!
Coach Dresser is legit. I really hope Babcock makes an effort to keep him around, and I think that'll happen.
My understanding is that Babcock has already enhanced Dresser's salary. I don't have a link, but that is what I heard. I think Whit will keep Dresser well satisfied. Wrestling is a program that we could legitimately build into a national power. Dresser has no interest in returning to Iowa, and genuinely likes the SW Va vibe. He's also a daggone good coach. I can see us getting to the point of being a perennial Top 10 type program, and maybe even higher.
One small weird thing about team scores in wrestling at the collegiate level involving the Tech Fall if no back points are scored it's only 4 points much like a major decision.
Yep, absolutely correct. Thanks for pointing that out.
Mission completed!!!
Just wait til we knock them off during March Madness!
...a guy can dream right?
Thanks for posting...I knew when I read the headline on Hokiesports, that you'd post a topic on the match! Go Hokies...VT wrestling is a top 3 favorite (sport) of mine. Here's to hoping for more wins!
I try to avoid the Hokiesports site until after I post this stuff (don't want to be tempted to copy anything), but if anyone's interested, their article about it is much more in-depth and can be found right here.
I love watching college wrestling live. I really wish it was bigger around Tech, and I think it's on its way to getting there.
I'd say it is starting to get bigger. As long as Christiansburg keeps producing these studs, then there will always be that fanbase. I'd say today much louder than the basketball game yesterday and looked like there were more fans as well.
Dresser's doing a great job recruiting nationally as well. He's got a couple kids from St. Paris Graham in Ohio, one of the best high school programs in the country. Man knows what he's doing, for sure.
I apologize if what I said sounded like, "I knew you would regurgitate info from another site to here". What I intended to say, was "I remember you too were a fan of wrestling, and I was looking forward to your recap". Sorry for the poor use of words.
Oh, no worries. Didn't take it that way at all, just wanted to make sure it was clear I wasn't copying and pasting. Besides, they do have a much more in-depth write-up. I tried to keep mine short 'n sweet. Party on.
Forgive me for my possible ignorance but is devin carter injured or did he graduate?
Devin Carter is still doing Devin Carter things. He was a little disappointing today (won by "only" a score of 12-6, although we really could have used the bonus points). Today was the last time he'll wrestle at 149 this year, as he made weight on track to get down to 141 for Vegas. He had to do it gradually, so he was at a significant weight disadvantage at 149. He could make another NCAA-finalist-type run this year. He's a senior this year.
And the injury you're thinking of was when he ripped his hamstring off his bones, kept wrestling and beat the guy from UVA, came back 3 months later, won the ACC and was the program's first NCAA finalist. Devin Carter is all that is man.
Good to know he stills kicks ass. Thanks for the detailed update. Please continue to make posts about the wrestling program in the future.
Will do. Glad to know there's some interest!
Devin looked a bit gassed in the 3rd. Have to think the cut got to him - hard to really be too disappointed knowing he was giving up 4-5 lbs on the OSU kid and what he has to go through to get down to 141 by Vegas. But I am glad the team score ultimately didn't come down to that missed bonus opportunity!
Speaking of giving up weight, how about Sal? What a motor on that kid. Been a while since I've seen an "unranked" wrestler force a top 10 guy into that many stall calls in one match. I put quotes since I think we all agree we'll see him in the rankings once he gets down to his true weight.
Oh yeah, the cut got to him, no question. The man's a beast though. Significant cut and giving up weight to a solid wrestler? I'll take a 6-point win there for sure. Like you, I'm really happy that lost point didn't come back to haunt us. I'm really looking forward to seeing how he performs at 141.
Sal is one of my favorite wrestlers on the team. The guy just goes all-out the whole match. His was a ton of fun to watch; I'm just bummed he couldn't pull it out in the end. I think he's gonna give a lot of highly-ranked guys a lot of problems throughout the year.
If you like wrestling and you like the fact that VT has become a powerhouse program in wrestling, this is a major reason to NOT join the SEC. SEC does not have a wrestling program. Missouri had to put their wrestling team in the MAC to continue the sport.
It should be noted only 6 ACC schools have wrestling programs. So, it's not like the ACC is a major conference for wrestling. But, 6 > 0. The Big10 is the only Power5 conference with all members participating in wrestling.
The conference situation is different for wrestling. There are wrestling only conferences like the EWL and EIWA because so few schools still have D1 wrestling. Joining the EIWA or MAC would be a step up. Especially the EIWA, that would be a great fit.
The Big East doesnt have wrestling either but VT was is the EWL at the time.
Conferences are arguably more important in wrestling than any sport because of the way NCAA tournament bids are allocated. In 2012 the EIWA had 46 qualifiers (second only to the big 10) and the ACC had 24, only one more than the now defunct (for wrestling) CAA. Granted the EIWA had more schools, and tech sends virtually all of its wrestlers to NCAAs anyway, but I think a marginal guy has a better chance of wrestling into the tournament in a bigger, better conference.
Not necessarily disagreeing with you, but hard to deny how quality of a conference the ACC has become in wrestling. VT, UVA and Pitt have all established themselves as programs that are a competitive dual opponent for almost anyone, and are seemingly sending 8+ wrestlers to NCAAs each year. NC State always seems to have one guy in the national title race (Caldwell and Gwiz of recent years) and their overall program is on the up and up for sure. UNC continues to underwhelm, but what is new there for anything UNC does.
The quantity may not exist in the ACC, but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find much better quality in any other league not named "Big".
Kinda on topic but slightly off, this same Ohio State team was wrestling again today in Charlottesville and let's just say it was not pretty. All Ohio State from start to finish.
TechHokie13 is happy with this.
They didn't print t-shirts, did they??!!
No, they just jumped up to #6 in the polls and got ready to kick some tail in Vegas.
Much better plan :)