Dickinson State, Notre Dame and McKendree (Ill.) each finished the round with six wrestlers garnering All-America honors and a spot on the podium.
Four major decisions and three pins were recorded in third-place matches. Closing out their seasons with major decisions were Missouri Valley’s Colin Pierce (133), Cumberland’s (Tenn.) Mikey Davis (141), Joe Sievert of Morningside (Iowa) (165) and Great Falls’ Michael French (184). Notre Dame 149-pounder Ashtin Primus stuck Ryan Jahn of McKendree in 1:24 and Alex Calvi of Great Falls registered a 6:27 fall of Northwestern’s (Iowa) Nic Leither at 197 pounds.
The only medal match that was pushed beyond regulation came at 174 pounds with Jameon Rush of Hastings (Neb.) emerging with the 10-5 sudden victory against McKendree’s Josh Bryant for fifth place. Nik Turner’s 1:23 pin earned the Oklahoma City junior his second All-American honor. The fall was only the sixth of his career, but third of this year’s event.
Charlie Gibbs aided Great Falls’ push to second place with a 41 second stick of Southern Oregon’s Ronald Lee at 197 pounds to earn a seventh-place finish. Oklahoma City senior Corey Johnson closed out his career in Star singlet as a two-time All-American with his 33rd career pin, notching a 4:15 fall of Jeremy Colbert of Bacone (Okla.).
Of 46 All-Americans from a year ago that entered the Championship, a trio of wrestlers became three-time All-Americans and 17 individuals earned their second honor.
Tyler Chang of Embry-Riddle (Ariz.) racked up his third All-America honor in as many trips to the National Championships by placing third at 157 pounds via 5-4 decision over Missouri Valley’s Joe Cornejo. The junior has previously earned accolades at 141 and 149 pounds during his freshman and sophomore campaigns, respectively.
McKendree junior Andrew Sanchez also became a three-time All-American at 197 pounds with a fifth-place finish. Adam Koballa had a medical forfeit in the fifth-place match at 141 pounds, but he still earned a third All-America accolade.
The event will close out Saturday evening with the Championship Finals starting at 6:30 p.m. Notre Dame will send four grapplers to the finals, followed by Southern Oregon with three. California Baptist and Great Falls each have two wrestlers that will contend for titles.
All 10 individual weight class championship matches will be streamed live via NeuLion, the parent company of JumpTV. Rich Tortorelli, Mark Van Paaschen and former Oklahoma City wrestler and two-time All-American John Wilcox will call the championship bouts. A fee of $7.95 is set to view the Saturday Championship finals event.
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