Wild and wacky regular season sets stage for entertaining postseason in college wrestling

Penn State true freshman Zain Retherford, a past Cadet World champion, is among a strong group of newcomers who have made a big impact in college wrestling this season. Darren Miller photo.

The news spread quickly across the nation’s college wrestling landscape this past Friday night. 

Wisconsin freshman Isaac Jordan had knocked off top-ranked and previously unbeaten junior James Green of Nebraska.

Jordan, who was ranked 11th nationally by The Open Mat, scored a takedown in the second sequence of sudden-victory overtime to earn a 3-1 win over Green. 

Two days later, Jordan used a late takedown to upset returning NCAA champion and third-ranked Derek St. John of Iowa 3-1 at 157 pounds.

Jordan’s weekend performance certainly was impressive, but his two wins shouldn’t come as a huge surprise in a wild and wacky season filled with an abundance of upsets. 

It’s been one of the craziest and most unpredictable college seasons in recent memory, setting up for an entertaining March with conference tournaments and the NCAA Championships just around the corner.

All seven returning NCAA champions from 2013 – including two-time champs Logan Stieber of Ohio State, Ed Ruth of Penn State and Tony Nelson of Minnesota – have suffered defeats this season. 

“I think our depth at the NCAA level is as strong as it has ever been,” Iowa State coach Kevin Jackson said. “There is a lot of good coaching going on with some very good quality wrestlers on a lot of teams. And there aren’t that many real dominant wrestlers right now, so you have a lot of parity. You’ve got to be real special to go undefeated because the competition is very tough at every weight class.”

Penn State senior David Taylor, a 2012 NCAA champion and Hodge Trophy winner, is the only wrestler who has remained No. 1 the entire season in The Open Mat rankings. The amazing Taylor is 26-0 this season at 165 pounds. Taylor, a bronze medalist at the 2013 World University Games, has been on a dominating run as he piles up bonus-point wins in his final collegiate season. 

“I don’t remember a season where more top-ranked wrestlers have been beaten through the course of the season,” said Jason Bryant, editor of The Open Mat. “We’re not just talking about preseason No. 1’s, but we’re talking about returning national champions.”

Taylor and 2010 NCAA champion Andrew Howe, a senior at Oklahoma, are the only past NCAA champions out of nine overall that are unbeaten this season. Howe is ranked No. 1 at 174. 

“It’s been a pretty crazy season, but when you think about it I don’t know that it’s all that surprising,” Northwestern coach Drew Pariano said. “There have been a lot of upsets, but it really speaks to the depth of the teams and the weight classes we have right now. There is a little bit more parity now than there’s been. There are returning NCAA champions that have lost three or four times this year. I know the seeding for the Big Ten tournament is going to be one of the most hotly contested we’ve ever seen because of what’s happened this season.”

Many of the upsets have been delivered by a strong crop of talented freshman stars who have embraced the challenge of facing more experienced, well-established wrestlers with glossy resumes. 

Penn State true freshman Zain Retherford, a past Cadet World champion, delivered an early stunner when he knocked off Stieber in an early season dual meet. Retherford remains unbeaten at 141.

Michigan true freshman Adam Coon, another past Cadet World champion, made an immediate impact at heavyweight despite the Big Ten being very strong in that weight class. He owns wins over a number of highly ranked wrestlers, including Nelson and All-American Bobby Telford of Iowa. Coon is ranked No. 1 nationally. 

“Retherford and Coon have already succeeded against top international competition at a World Championships – they’ve wrestled on a very big stage already,” Pariano said. “Guys are more experienced when they come into college now. Wrestling in the summer makes a big difference. When these guys come into college they aren’t intimidated by some of the older guys they are facing.”

The biggest stunner of the season came when Cornell freshman Gabe Dean ended Ruth’s 84-match winning streak in the finals of the Southern Scuffle. Ruth, a senior, hadn’t lost a collegiate match since his freshman year before the loss to Dean at 184 pounds. 

Iowa freshman Thomas Gilman upset returning NCAA champion and then-No. 1 Jesse Delgado of Illinois at the Midlands Championships.

Gilman, a past Cadet and Junior World Team member, may not even be Iowa’s starter at 125 in the postseason. He has shared the starting spot with fellow freshman Cory Clark, a Junior Nationals champion who upset Delgado during his redshirt season last year. 

Pariano has a talented freshman of his own in Jason Tsirtsis, a past Junior World Team member who is ranked sixth at 149.

“A lot of these freshmen come in and they’re very hungry and excited to succeed,” Pariano said. “They relish the challenge to compete at this level. And sometimes these freshmen are healthier than the older guys who may have more wear and tear on them.” 

A number of these top freshmen train in college rooms that also double as the homes for Olympic Regional Training Centers for freestyle wrestling.

“I think that makes a very big difference,” said Jackson, who previously served as the U.S. National Freestyle Coach. “Being exposed to a lot of these top wrestlers who are excelling on the international level obviously helps them with their own development.”

All of the upsets, combined with the emergence of numerous newcomers, have made the weekly national rankings an adventure.

“Rankings have been especially difficult, given the amount of parity that exists in college wrestling,” Bryant said. “Incoming freshmen are immediately competitive, whether they redshirt or not. We’ve seen that with Zain Retherford and Adam Coon. Both of those guys defeated defending NCAA champions during their first few months of college wrestling.” 

Not even the powerful Penn State team, gunning for its fourth straight NCAA team title, has made it through the season unbeaten. The top-ranked Nittany Lions dropped a recent Big Ten dual at No. 2 Minnesota.

Nelson has won Big Tens and NCAAs the past two seasons, but he may be only the No. 4 or No. 5 seed at next month’s Big Ten tournament in Madison, Wis. 

St. John owns Big Ten and NCAA titles, but he may be only the No. 4 seed at the league tournament. Stieber, who owns two Big Ten and two NCAA titles, likely will be the second seed at the Big Ten meet. 

Just six wrestlers who have wrestled at least 10 matches this season have made it to this point in the season with undefeated records.

That group includes Taylor, Howe, Retherford, Clark, Edinboro’s Mitchell Port (141) and Maryland’s Jim Sheptock (184). Howe handed returning NCAA champion Chris Perry of Oklahoma State his only loss of the season. 

All of the upsets and parity should make for a very compelling postseason.

“I think it’s going to be a really good NCAA tournament,” said Jackson, who has a top-ranked wrestler in 197-pounder Kyven Gadson. “It comes down to who has a hot tournament and who gets on a roll. And who finds that window of focus, and competes to their full potential and maybe even exceeds that. As we know, the favorite doesn’t always win.”