Dark Energy

For some of the broadcasts you could so clearly hear the loud bellyaching and whining from the coaches. More so than usual. Not a good ‘sound.’

Nice. Where is Mizzou?

I don’t know how to link a tweet here. Our very own MatScouts retweeted a tweet that shows the finish to the mat deemed illegal. Angle isn’t great but it does seem to put the lifted opponent down on head and Gomez lifts own feet into air which has effect of driving opponent even harder into mat. Does look illegal to me. Are there others that disagree? Second Q - Bono can be heard in the video saying that you can’t slam from a double leg. Verdict? I say BS. Gomez had opponent clearly lifted into air. You can do an illegal slam from that position.

As we all know, D1 wrestling tends to have a few programs with most of the very best wrestlers. And many programs who would consider it a big win to have a single All American. Let’s imagine a world where there was much greater parity. Of the 80 AA’s, they come from 60 or so schools. Almost all schools have more then one national qualifier. A big deal to have more than one national champ from a school. Very few schools getting 5 or more of their wrestlers to be big show. Ok - with that … would individual tournament still be the right way to crown team championship? Or, in this scenario, would a championship based on duals be more justified? Seems like one National champ and 2 AA’s might do the trick to get a team title. Doesn’t feel satisfactory. (AND YES, THIS IS A HYPOTHETICAL - curious to hear thought processes)

Thanks all. Have a good list here.

Outside of the Spencer and Yianni push for four, lay out the best story lines. No need to debate them. Max Dean #1: Left Cornell early to go to PSU and is wrestling 197. Bumped a returning AA out of lineup - Michael Beard . Beard left to be a starter. At Lehigh. Beats Max in dual this year. Match at NCAAs will have all eyes on it. Max Dean #2: Turns out Cornell has a decent 197. Jacob Cardenas. Who just beat Beard. Can Cardenas beat Dean? Odds are low but I’d call this juicy. Others?

Hoping for some help. Missed most of conferences .. but did see a few matches. Want to spend some time watching some … but would love an assist when it comes to finding the right matches to watch. Preferences - Good action, good scoring. At least one wrestler scoring 5+ points in the match. Doesn’t need to be high seeds wrestling .. want it to be good wrestling with some excellent technique. If something really interesting and out of the ordinary (novel technique, big controversy), that is bonus. pls indicate conference and wrestler names. Pls don’t give away the result. Any color on why a good match to go find would be awesome. Thanks in advance!!! Just watched Cardenas vs Beard. Lots of action.

Ref not giving reversal to Poulin even though he has Surtin nearly pinned for quite a while. Curious to hear thoughts on this. I agree can’t call reversal quickly but it was there long enough that I felt it was deserved even though Surtin had the cradle. Eventually awarded but only after cradle was lost.

Carr v O’Toole - 2023 Big 12 finals. Small crowd vote here suggests Carr is favored (64% picking Carr). Will judge the wisdom of small crowd in a few minutes. 1st Period - hand fighting. Generally staying out of tie ups. Both guys warmed for face taps. O in with C leg up. Almost TD. On edge. Has far ankle but stalemate called. challenge … challenge lost. C fires and misses. 0-0 end of first. 2nd - O down. C riding. O to feet, hoists arm over head, turns in. And out. 1-0 O’Toole. Has front headlock, tries to get around corner but Carr pivots. Nada. Ref warning on fingers. O fires and misses. Is more aggressive. C tries super duck but O steps aside. 3rd period. Carr down. Caution on Carr. Care out fast. 1-1. Carr fires - leg up. O Toole makes it hard. Wow. Carr pulls him back on mat. Goes to mat. O grabs lag but Carr has O’s legs tangled .. and given the 2! Challenge … how many Challenges does Mizzou get? Already lost one. Challenge lost! 3-1 Carr. O to feet. Care warned for stalling. O out. 3-2 stalling on Carr!!! 3-3!!! He was backing. OT!! Carr fires. Close …. O toole D is for real. Carr pulling him in. And again. 2 with backs!!! Pin!!! Carr wins!!!

Cardenas (Cornell) beats Beard (Lehigh). Pretty surprising. Didn’t see it but reading that Beard’s tank was shallow. list out some more!

Right call by ref to not give reversal until cradle gone? Poulin was keeping him on his back for a long time but no 2 given, until got head out.

Details pls

Sweet. In preview doc, so cool having all the NCAA brackets right there.

Zahid in on double. Hoisted over. Given 4. Challenge. I didn’t see any stop and change in direction. But challenge won. So Zahid down 4-2. Zahid aggressor. 2 step outs. 4-4. Hunting low ankles. Stuck under. Ukrainian hoists and given two for an exposure. Hmmm. Very close. No challenge. Zahid TD. 6-6 but UKR has criteria. 10 sec left in 1st. 2nd - ref gives point to Z for hands to face. Chair doesn’t agree. 6-6. Zahid hunting. UKR does fire. Nada. Chair very vocal. Looks like UKR warmed for passivity. Z trapped under. UKR blocking off. Does fire. Z turned on chest wrap. 6-8. 25 sec to go. 1 to Zahid, no. Not given. Zahid loses He has not separated from world pack.

Vincenzo forfeits.

Tevanyan is good. Up 6-1 vs McKenna … two TDs and a gut. In 2nd. McKenna can’t get to offense. Tries. Counter attack by Tevanyan - gets leg and TD. 8-1 with 30 sec to go. Ends 8-2 with a caution point award for hard head swipe.

The fact that you need to point out things you don’t hate simply confirms that you default to hate. Pretty interesting character feature for you.

I concur. Suriano hosed. That said, didn’t do much either. Looked like a Greco match. Desanto wrestled a good match. Wins by pin. International wrestlers sometimes don’t try all that hard to keep blades off mat. Basically a double leg hold to a pin. Was wrestling well. At break, opponent was showing something on his arm to ref. Ref ignored. Wonder what that was about. And then at end, after pin, Desanto seemed to have something going on with eyes (burning?). Weird.

Anyone have a sense for finals timing? I’m on UWW app. Hmmm. Looks like it is predicting when matches will happen. Also looks to be using US eastern time for the times. ??? Very cool if so. For example, next McKenna match saying 11:36. Do I have this right?

Saw Desanto in Semi. Was aggressive off the bat. Appreciate that. Was not effective in the aggression though. Down 0-4 could see that perhaps he would wear down the Ukrainian … mop the mat in the 2nd. But …. TD to lace and he loses 0-10 in first period.

18 year old winning it is more impressive than 20 yr olds. Oh wait, how old are redshirt freshman now? 21? 22? LOL.

At some point … some point … you have to step back and say … ‘Over and over again I get screwed over by those I’m dealing with and end up in a crappy spot …. over and over. Others don’t seem to have the same cluster F situations on a consistent basis. Maybe I do have some accountability in all this. Maybe I need to change.’ He probably has thought something like this. And then quickly added. ‘Nah.’

Keegan and Carr spoke up before their match. Gave us confidence they would wrestle. Easy to do now. Just need one to ‘call out’ the other on Twitter or something else. Can do it respectfully. Maybe we need a hero that will track if wrestlers are publicly committing to wrestle big(ger) matches. If no public commitment, we can increase odds of it not happening and not change other plans to try and watch. Hero can even be the one to prompt commits / replies. Respected voice - tweets out to both guys. See if a firm and positive response comes back. Sucks to have to look for something like this. This likely won’t work. But hey .. spitballing.

Watching it now. So moving. So … wow. God bless the coach and wife that welcomed him into their home and life. And the other families, all those that showed the best side of humanity … The humanity and love shown … wishing there was more of that in the world.

The technical acumen Carr showed to get the first TD was awesome. And then for the second, he knew Keegan was going to try to throw leg over again — was ready for it … and then, what an excellent methodical finish. Turned me into a big fan.