The saga surrounding the Gophers is winding down, and with the team outperforming expectations, all seems well in the Big Ten. Let's hope that their program, and others around the NCAA, can avoid this type of negative publicity in the future. Good luck to the Gophers and Coach Eggum.
To your questions …
Jim Zalesky coaching at the Pac-12 Championships (Photo/Tony Rotundo, WrestlersAreWarriors.com)Q: What are your thoughts on the Oregon State wrestling program? More specifically do you think Jim Zalesky's job is at risk? He has no doubt done some wonderful things to the program, but over the years a lot of his highly touted recruits seem to consistently underperform their expectations, especially in their upperclassmen years (Mike Mangrum and R.J. Pena immediately come to mind). I feel like very few of his wrestlers peak and their development seems more stagnant in their time with the program than anything else. Couple that with their run of form as of late and I can't help but things may be a bit bleak for the Beavers.
-- Dan L.
Foley: Oregon State has a very proud wrestling tradition and hired Jim Zalesky to help them create a powerhouse West Coast presence. While he enjoyed some success the first 8-10 years at the helm, that success has waned and the Pacific dominance is being challenged by a resurgent Stanford program, an upstart Cal Poly program and an Arizona State team that has future NCAA champions floating in the lineup.
Win or be replaced is what college athletics is about and if Coach Zalesky can't find more wins in the conference, a higher NCAA finish or an NCAA champion or two, then it's not difficult to imagine the school moving in a new direction.
Q: I know it's all speculation and projection at this point, but I would be interested in hearing five candidates to take over as head wrestling coach at Pitt. Seems like a program with a lot of potential if they get the right coach in place.
-- Mike C.
Foley: The situation at Pitt is still developing and the impact of the wrestlers' actions might not be known for several months. We've seen with Minnesota that there is almost no way to determine how the administration will respond.
If the Panthers are looking to become a powerhouse wrestling program it'll require that they make an investment in securing a top-level coach. Right now the top prospects will need to be woo'ed with a big budget, promises of administrative support and a hefty salary.
Luckily for Pitt the school is in the single most powerful wrestling area in the country. Capitalizing on the school's location to land recruits should not be difficult.
Here is my list for Pitt:
1. Jody Strittmatter, Young Guns Wrestling Club
2. Damion Hahn, Cornell
3. Casey Cunningham, Penn State
4. Scott and Josh Moore, Lock Haven and Cleveland State
5. Matt Kocher, Pitt
Q: Thoughts on Mark Hall? Do you think he can be in the top four come March?
-- Ryan P.
Foley: Mark Hall is very talented and well coached. Mark Hall can win big matches. Mark Hall's loss was not the end of his career or Penn State's title dreams.
However, I do think the match exposed some flaws in Mark Hall's collegiate wrestling style. He's very upright, lacks a variety of attacks and displayed little top control. While he was stronger and more able on his feet than other high schoolers in scholastic wrestling, he's lost those advantages in college. I've said he was an All-American candidate this season and will stick to that prediction. He can place top 5-8, but I have trouble seeing him in the national finals and wouldn't be shocked if he didn't place in St. Louis.
Q: What did you make of Brandon Sorensen nearly upsetting Zain Retherford last Friday? Has Sorensen closed the gap? Or was it just an off night for Retherford?
-- Mike C.
Foley: I was very impressed with Brandon Sorensen's effort last week, but also impressed with his technical finish to that first single leg -- locked the hip, set the table and drove forward.
To me, Penn State looked off all night. They lacked some of the punch we'd seen out of their program in other big duals and certainly at the NCAAs. They typically wrestle with the enthusiasm of someone like Bo Nickal, more than the bleak post-apocalyptic facial expressions of Retherford!
As for betting odds, I'd place the Retherford-Sorensen rematch as a pick 'em.
Q: I noticed the rankings this week, and decided to take a closer look at the Penn State-Oklahoma State head-to-head matchup. I'm not going to dispute the individual rankings, but they do create a conflict when assessing the team battle.
The question: If InterMat has PSU out-ranking Oklahoma State in 7 out of 10 weight classes, how can InterMat then rank Oklahoma State as the No. 1 dual meet team?
Not trying to influence where this lands, but this is not possible based on the current team scoring system. Any thoughts?
-- Chris W.
Foley: From the InterMat rankings committee …
Oklahoma State started the season ranked No. 1 and has gone undefeated, beating several ranked teams, including Iowa, Cornell, Minnesota, Oklahoma and South Dakota State. The Cowboys have not done anything to surrender their No. 1 ranking. Penn State started the season ranked No. 4. The Nittany Lions have continued to climb the rankings based on their dual meet results … and now sit at No. 2. While Penn State may be favored in more matches against Oklahoma State -- and may win on paper -- Oklahoma State remains No. 1 based on where they started the season and their season results. After the season begins, InterMat's dual meet rankings are based on dual meet results, not which team wins on paper.
If the rankings hold, Oklahoma and Penn State will meet in the NWCA Division I National Duals finals. Obviously, if Penn State wins they become the No. 1 dual meet team. However, until Oklahoma State does something to surrender their No. 1 ranking, they will remain No. 1.
Penn State moved to No. 1 in the tournament rankings, which is based on the rankings of their individual wrestlers.
MULTIMEDIA HALFTIME
Luke Pletcher wins Twitter
Leaving tomorrow to wrestle in carver hawkeye arena and I am just going to assume that I am already stalling
�" Luke Pletcher (@LukePletcher) January 26, 2017
Q: After reading Mark's piece on Jean Hazewinkel, I was struck by the fact that her twin sons, Jim and Dave, were able to jump into wrestling during high school and find immediate success in the sport, and this makes me wonder whether it's possible for athletes today to replicate this type of wrestling success in light of early sport specialization and the many other factors that surround youth athletics today. There's a lot at play here, and I don't know whether it's even possible to make this sort of analysis as I'm sure it depends on a lot of factors (i.e. locale), but I wanted to run it by you since I primarily have a soccer background and am only a casual wrestling fan.
-- Evan B.
Foley: There is a lot to unpack when determining the ability of a young wrestler to excel at the high school and collegiate level.
First, the athleticism of the wrestler is most important. If he's coming in from gymnastics (Mark Schultz) then there is certainly no limit to what you teach them on the mat. Given the right incubator and balance between competition and technique there is some success one could expect.
However, with the younger specialization what happens more often is that their relative success tends to draw more coaching resources from the lesser-talented individuals, regardless of their long term trajectory. Even high school coaches need to win to keep their job.
I think the best approach might be to introduce young kids to wrestling skills while also giving them ample experience in body-knowledge sports like gymnastics. Recent work by those in education seems to show that movement is the best indicator of athletic development, not necessarily competition. Might be worth a think for some parents.
Q: With all of the talk of making NCAA wrestling more offensive/exciting, why not make a takedown worth 2.5 points? It seems a lot of guys get a first-period takedown then try to ride that out to the end of the match stalling and exchanging escapes for a narrow victory. This would also award the more aggressive wrestler who is able to get multiple takedowns a larger lead, in turn forcing their opponent to become more offensive minded.
-- Chris C.
Foley: Why wouldn't it just be 3 points per takedown? Alternatively they could stop giving a point for the escape …
I think most coaches -- including Tom Brands -- are requesting an overhaul of the rules via a meeting of top coaches and the rules committee. The tinkering of the rules over the past few years has left us with an odd product. The out of bounds rules are a sore subject for many analysts and while watching with my wife she noted that it made absolutely no sense that out of bounds was not indeed out of bounds. That led to an existential discussion of what is and is not in-bounds. Painful stuff.
Q: I was trying to go through each weight class and see who will be the likely No. 1 seed at NCAAs and I realized there is a good chance every No. 1 seed will be undefeated come NCAAs:
125: Thomas Gilman
133: Nathan Tomasello
141: Dean Heil
149: Zain Retherford
157: Jason Nolf
165: Isaiah Martinez
174: Bo Jordan
184: Gabe Dean
197: J'den Cox
285: Kyle Snyder
What I also realized is that unless Zahid Valencia gets the No. 1 seed over Bo Jordan (or obviously an upset like Nick Suriano over Thomas Gilman, Cory Clark over Nathan Tomasello, etc.), every No. 1 seed would not only be undefeated but they would've been the preseason consensus No. 1. Do you see these 10 wrestlers going in undefeated going into NCAAs? Do you know if something like this happened before?
-- Eric B.
Foley: I think that having the top guys undefeated at this point in the season is very possible as there are more tournaments in the early season as well as out of conference dual meets. That should change in the next few weeks as more Big Ten schools and close rivals begin to butt heads.
If all 10 go undefeated? Then yes, that would be highly uncommon and has never (to my knowledge) happened in any other year. The normal number of undefeated national champions is 3-5 with some years coming in heavier. All 10 would almost certainly be unprecedented.
Q: Kyle Snyder is going to miss the Ohio State-Iowa dual this weekend because he'll be at the Yarygin. However, I noticed that the World Cup in Tehran which Kyle is scheduled go to also looks like it overlaps with the NWCA Division I National Duals. While it's unlikely Ohio State will beat both Iowa and Penn State (even assuming Snyder is back for that dual), if the Buckeyes did go in the National Duals as the No. 1 or No. 2 team wrestling for the championship, do you think Kyle should consider wrestling in that instead of the World Cup, giving Ohio State its best shot at winning it?
-- Eric B.
Foley: I don't think Kyle is going to the World Cup in Kermanshah, leaving him available to compete at the NWCA Division I National Duals.
Q: The NCAA was supposed to announce the sites for the 2019-2022 NCAA championships last month. Have you heard anything?
-- Mike C.
Foley: Nothing.
Recommended Comments
There are no comments to display.
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now