Nittany Lions Remain Undefeated with Win Over Wisconsin
No. 3 Penn State conquered its third road dual in a row after a bit of a slow start to the season. Despite another forfeited 125 dual, the Nittany Lions won out the remaining matches and defeated Wisconsin 34-6.
Once again, no 125 wrestlers were cleared to compete on Tuesday. In the rest of the bouts, we saw two tech falls and three major decisions. No. 2 Nick Lee teched his Badger opponent in just three minutes with attack after attack and a few turns for back points.
Senior Luke Gardner got the start at 149 and wrestled an unranked Badger opponent for what ended up being the most exciting matchup of the evening. Gardner scored a quick takedown to open the match, then took a late shot towards the end of the first which Drew Scharenbrock countered to close the period with a 3-2 lead. Gardner chose down and escaped to tie it up in the second and finished another takedown to stretch his lead. Scharenbrock escaped to make it 5-4 at the end of the second then chose down to start the third. The Badger quickly escaped to tie things up at 5-5 and after several scrambles throughout the third, the match went into sudden victory. Gardner acted fast, scoring a takedown for the win just seconds into sudden victory for a highlight reel-worthy, 7-5 win.
No. 9 Brady Berge and No. 6 Nick Lee followed with back-to-back majors. Later, No. 3 Aaron Brooks faced No. 10 Chris Weiler for a highly anticipated matchup, which Brooks quickly dominated for another major decision win for Penn State. Then, we saw freshman No. 13 Michael Beard make his Penn State debut at 197 with a dominant tech fall in just 4 minutes and 43 seconds.
Penn State moves to a 3-0 record and gets its first home match on Friday, February 12 against the top-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes in Rec Hall. The late-night matchup starts at 9 pm EST and will be televised on the Big Ten Network.
BOUT BY BOUT
PSU- 34, WI- 6
125: WIS Eric Barnett win by forfeit
133: PSU No. 3 Roman Bravo-Young dec. WIS Kyle Burwick
141: PSU No. 2 Nick Lee tech fall WIS Trey Escobar, 16-1 (TF; 3:00)
149: PSU Luke Gardner dec. WIS Drew Scharenbrock, 7-5 (sv)
157: PSU No. 9 Brady Berge maj. dec. WIS Garrett Model, 12-4
165: PSU No. 6 Joe Lee maj. dec. WIS Patrick Spray, 12-3
174: PSU No. 8 Carter Starocci dec. WIS Jared Krattiger, 5-3
184: PSU No. 3 Aaron Brooks maj. dec. WIS No. 10 Chris Weiler, 13-3
197: PSU No. 13 Michael Beard tech fall WIS Andrew Salemme, 18-2 (TF; 4:43)
285: PSU No. 8 Seth Nevills PSU dec. WIS Peter Christensen, 4-3
