Reina encouraged by Wrestling's performance

Several Quakers turned in their best performances of the season on Sunday. The Penn wrestling team's results at the Penn State Open on Sunday have coach Roger Reina confident that his squad is making steps in the right direction and towards better recognition in the national polls. "Without a doubt, last weekend was our best performance out of all our tournaments so far," Reina said. "It was definitely a top-10 or at least near top-10 division performance." With a field of over 400 wrestlers and teams like No. 4 Penn State and No. 7 Central Michigan, the Penn State Open proved to be a good test of the No. 17 Quakers' abilities before the highly-competitive holiday tournament season began. According to Reina, Penn passed the test, placing eight of its nine wrestlers on the day. The 13-year coach is now "very encouraged with our team's performance." · Last year's Ivy League Rookie of the Year Rick Springman (165 lbs.) was Penn's lone champion at Sunday's Open. This was his second championship win this season, and his third trip to the final round in as many tournaments. His only loss came in the finals of the Keystone Classic against Arizona State's Steve Blackford, the No. 8 ranked wrestler in the preseason InterMat national rankings. Springman's continued success pleased his coach. "Rick seems to be improving each week, and that's really all we want," Reina said. Springman took third place in last year's Penn State Open. · Penn tri-captain and fourth-ranked Brett Matter (149 lbs.) met Penn State's second-ranked Jamarr Billman in the finals of the Open Sunday night. This was the first time this season that Matter faced a wrestler with a higher national ranking than his own. Matter came back from a deficit early in the match to take a one-point lead in the third round. But Billman ended up tying the score by the end of regulation to send the match into "sudden victory" -- formerly "sudden death" -- overtime, where the Nittany Lion kept his second-place ranking secure with a quick take-down of Matter. The loss brought an end to Matter's season-long unbeaten streak, but Reina thinks that it may be beneficial for Matter this early in the season. "In our sport, if you have anybody undefeated, you're not wrestling the right people often enough," Reina said. "[Matter's] taking it as a champion should. He's learning from it and making the proper corrections to make sure it doesn't happen again." · A few Quakers gained a lot of headway at the Penn State Open, even though they did not advance to the final round. Sophomore Justin Bravo (125 lbs.) met with a pair of quality opponents in his final two matches, Penn State's No. 3 Jeremy Hunter in the semifinals and North Carolina's No. 5 Chucky Connors in the third-place match. Even though Bravo lost both matches, Reina felt he had a very strong tournament. "He began to incorporate what he's been doing in his training into actual competition," Reina said. "I think it was a great learning experience." Senior Ryan Slack (174 lbs.) took fifth place at the Open, which Reina said was "a markedly improved performance over two weeks ago at the Keystone [Classic]" where he did not place. Junior Mike Gadsby (184 lbs.) also took fifth place, and senior Randall Braunfeld (125 lbs.) turned in a top-eight performance. · Junior Jonathan Gough (149 lbs.) gets the crutch award for the night, going 2-2 in his matches while wrestling with two different injuries. "Jonathan wrestled with a lot of heart and a lot of courage, and is one of the reasons that I was so pleased with our performance on Sunday," Reina said. "To have this top-10 or near top-10 performance is very exciting."