Black and Land advance to semifinals in Greco-Roman, Ward to wrestle for bronze in women’s freestyle at the Cadet World Championships

Photo of Otto Black courtesy of ringerspiegel.ch/Gerhard Remus

Budapest, Hungary – Otto Black and Cory Land both reached the semifinals in the first session of Greco-Roman at the 2021 Cadet World Championships.

Black, who competes at 48 kg, opened his tournament with a big win over Armenia’s Yuri Karapetyan, a 2021 U15 European champion. Karapetyan took an early lead, 1-0, on the strength of a passivity point. In the second period, Black scored a takedown to pull ahead, 2-1, with a little over a minute left on the clock. Karapetyan was forced to get aggressive, which Black capitalized on, countering a head pinch attempt to pick up the fall at 3:37 mark.

In the quarterfinals, Black controlled the action, earning a 4-0 victory over Hungary’s Peter Totok. The only points came in a flurry in the first period resulting in Black transitioning a takedown straight into a gut wrench. In the semifinals, he will face 2021 Cadet European silver medalist Servet Angi of Turkey.

At 55 kg, Land, a 2019 Cadet World Team member, opened his tournament with a dominant 10-0 technical fall over Turkey’s Berati Inac, a 2021 Cadet European bronze medalist. He followed it up with a hard-fought quarterfinal win over Sweden’s Adam Silverin. The match was a back-and-forth affair, but Land scored a four-point throw late in the second period to give him the lead, which he didn’t relinquish again, ultimately winning 9-6. In the semifinal, he will wrestle Zhantoro Mirazaliev of Kyrgyzstan.

Both Black and Land have guaranteed that they will wrestle for a medal. The other three wrestlers that began their tournaments today will have to wait for the semifinal results to know if they will be pulled into repechage.

At 65 kg, Jadon Skellenger opened his tournament with back-to-back technical fall victories over Rokas Cepauskas of Lithuania, 9-0, and Ashot Poghosyan of Bulgaria, 8-0. In the quarterfinals, he fell to 2019 U15 Asian champion Ankit Guli of India, 14-6.

Ryder Rogotzke also reached the quarterfinals after pinning Croatia’s Mihael Salajec via headlock in 1:28. He dropped his next match to Azerbaijan’s Joju Samadov, 11-4.

Jim Mullen, who won a silver medal in freestyle earlier this week, lost his opening match to Cadet European silver medalist Nikita Ovsjanikov of Germany, 7-2. Ovsjanikov won his quarterfinal match but will need to make the finals to pull Mullen into repechage.

Ava Ward was the lone wrestler in repechage for Team USA in women’s freestyle. Ward pinned Ukraine’s Anastasiia Zadvorna in 2:55 to advance to tonight’s bronze medal match. She was leading, 4-0, before cradling Zadvorna up for the pin. Ward will face 2021 Cadet European champion Svetlana Katenka of Belarus for bronze.

Three other Americans, Erica Pastoriza, Katie Gomez and Amit Elor will all wrestle for gold in tonight’s medal round as well.

Greco-Roman semifinal wrestling begins at 10:45 a.m. EST and will be followed by the women’s freestyle medal round at 12:00 p.m. EST. The tournament streams live on FloWrestling.

2021 Cadet World Championships

at Budapest, Hungary, July 19-25

Greco-Roman results

48 kg: Otto Black (Castle Rock, Colo.)
WIN Yuri Karapetyan (Armenia),
WIN Peter Totok (Hungary), 4-0
vs. Servet Angi (Turkey)

55 kg: Cory Land (Moody, Ala.)
WIN Berati Inac (Turkey), 10-0
WIN Adam Silverin (Sweden), 9-6
vs. Zhantoro Mirazaliev (Kyrgyzstan)

65 kg: Jadon Skellenger (Meridian, Idaho)
WIN Rokas Cepauskas (Lithuania), 9-02019
WIN Ashot Poghosyan (Bulgaria), 8-0
LOSS Ankit Guli (India), 14-6

80 kg: Ryder Rogotzke (Lakeland, Minn.)
WIN Mihael Salajec (Croatia), FALL
LOSS Joju Samadov (Azerbaijan), 11-4

110 kg: James Mullen (Harrington Park, N.J.)
LOSS Nikita Ovsjanikov (Germany), 7-2

Women’s Freestyle Repechage Results

46 kg: Ava Ward (Centralia, Mo.)
WIN Yana Dimitrova (Bulgaria), FALL 2:22
LOSS Komal Komal (India) FALL, 3:36.
WIN Anastasiia Zadvorna (Ukraine), FALL 2:55
vs. Svetlana Katenka (Belarus)