OKLAHOMA CITY -- After one day at the NCAA Wrestling Championships in Oklahoma City, Penn's contingent of six qualifiers has been whittled down to four.
Matt Valenti, seeded sixth in the 133-pound bracket, went 2-0 on the day and is the only Quakers wrestler remaining in the championship bracket. Three others -- 125-pounder Mike Silengo, 12th-seeded Matt Dragon (149), and 12th-seeded Matt Herrington (174) -- are still alive in their respective wrestle-back brackets. And two Penn grapplers, freshman Cesar Grajales and senior Dustin Wiles, left the Ford Center empty-handed yesterday, having been eliminated from competition.
"I think in some spots we competed well and there were some spots where we could have done a little better," Penn coach Zeke Jones said afterwards.
As expected, Valenti paced the Quakers. The junior captain, who set a Penn record this season by becoming the first wrestler to amass 100 wins in his three seasons, won both of his matches by falls.
"Matt Valenti's doing a nice job right now," Jones said. "He's in prime position in the quarterfinals."
The first pin came against Brandon Strong of Air Force. Already up 9-3 and cruising in the third period, Valenti managed to turn his opponent to get the fall with 1:15 remaining.
The second of the two pins came in the next round, a rematch of his EIWA finals win against Robbie Preston of Harvard, seeded 11th in the weightclass. By the third period, it became obvious that Valenti would advance to the quarterfinals as he was up 6-1. Then, with three seconds left, Penn's top-ranked wrestler turned Preston over and ended the match with just three seconds left on the clock.
"When I took him down, I felt him kind of break a little bit," Valenti said of the sequence of events that led to the fall. "After that last takedown, he pretty much just gave up the fact that he had a shot at winning."
Aside from Valenti, only one other Penn wrestler won his match in the afternoon session. After falling to defending national champion Joe Dubuque of Indiana in the morning session, Mike Silengo won Penn's final bout of the day to advance in the 125-pound consolation bracket. Wrestling against Collin Cudd of Wisconsin, the senior built up a 9-3 lead in the third period and held on for the 10-6 win. According to Jones, the victory was a big one for the team.
"When we went through a rough patch there for a little bit of time, it's nice to end on a good note and end on a win," Jones said."
In order to advance deep into the tournament and keep alive the possibility of attaining All-American status, Silengo and the two other Penn wrestlers in the consolation bracket will have to wrestle double the amount of matches of those in the championship bracket. But Valenti, who lost in the first round as a freshman and came back to finish in 12th place, knows what his teammates will have to do.
"It's a real tough thing, especially to bounce back from a hard loss," he said. "But I think we've got a couple of guys with real big hearts, and we're ready to compete and keep going. We're a team that's in great shape, and we're going to keep pushing everybody."
The saddest story of the day for the sixth place Quakers certainly had to be senior co-captain Dustin Wiles. After making Nationals last year at 174, he qualified this season by finishing third at 184 in the EIWAs. But the Farmington, Mo., native tasted only disappointment this time around, losing both of his matches and ending his career on a down note.
"Unfortunately, we lost Dustin; he was never able to get his motor running, and that was disappointing for him," Jones said.
"It's hard to go out, especially 0-2," Valenti said of his teammate. "But you can't have any regrets; [the] kid wrestled his butt off all year, held nothing back. He's got the heart of a lion; he wrestles hard. You can't ask for anything else."
