Iowa’s Brands unhappy with team’s intensity at Midlands
EVANSTON, Ill. Iowa continued a recurring habit Thursday by winning the vast majority of its wrestling matches and doing so in a fashion that didn’t appease coach Tom Brands.
Iowa State, on the other hand, bucked one trend and continued another during the opening day of the Midlands Championships.
The Hawkeyes surged to the top of the team standings and Iowa State freshman Luke Goettl made a stunning run to the semifinals at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
Five Hawkeyes advanced to this afternoon’s semifinals and Iowa’s designated 10-man scoring lineup compiled a 27-5 record for the day as the top-ranked team in college wrestling racked up 79.5 points. Northwestern is second with 71.
Across the board, though, the scores were too close for comfort for Iowa — or at least too close for Brands. He urged his team prior to the tournament to display more urgency. He didn’t see it.
“I saw hesitation, saw vulnerability because of it and in some cases the vulnerability cost us the match,” Brands said after an 18-2 opening session. “In other cases, the vulnerability didn’t cost us the match, but why not take it and put it away?”
That’s what Iowa State’s Goettl did. The freshman entered the tournament with a 1-4 record with two losses by major decision and another by fall. He won four straight Thursday and three against seeded opponents, including a 5-3 upset of Penn’s second-ranked Zack Kemmerer in the second round at 141 pounds.
Goettl continued his run by pinning No. 10 seed Billy Ashnault of Rutgers in Thursday night’s quarterfinals. He will be joined in the semifinals by 165-pound teammate Andrew Sorenson, along with Northern Iowa’s Ryan Loder at 184 and Wartburg’s Byron Tate at 197.
Loder notched a fall and two major decisions and Tate, a Midlands runner-up last year, knocked off a pair of seeded opponents. Both expected to reach the semifinals.
Goettl may have, as well, but few would’ve agreed with him at the start of the tournament. He said a healthier knee and better state of mind led to his performance.
“To be honest with you, I’m just going out and wrestling,” he said. “I don’t really care who it is, I’m just going to go out and do what I can do. If it works out, it works out, and so far it’s working out.”
For weeks, Iowa State coach Kevin Jackson forecasted a breakthrough for his freshmen as losses and injuries mounted for the Cyclones. Goettl’s big day was soured when teammate Chris Spangler, the No. 1 seed at 174, defaulted in the quarterfinals against Wisconsin-Parkside’s Luke Rynish.
“We didn’t know it because he didn’t tell us, but he dinged his head in an earlier match, which makes sense with the way he wrestled earlier today,” Jackson said. “Then he hit his head in that match and that’s when me and (assistant) Travis (Paulson) noticed he wasn’t wrestling like he normally wrestles — and he’s had a history of concussions. He looked concussed to me.”
Iowa didn’t wrestle quite like itself, either, during a 5-3 quarterfinal round.
Second-seeded Matt McDonough rolled into the semis with a 13-4 major decision against Jared Germaine of Eastern Michigan. But all of the other quarterfinals were difficult for the Hawkeyes.
Top seed Tony Ramos edged teammate Tyler Clark 5-3 at 133, No.1 Montell Marion survived at 141, Bobby Telford squeaked by at heavyweight and Ethen Lofthouse, the No. 2 seed at 174, needed a late escape to edge John Martin-Cannon 4-3.
“I can feel (I need to do more) like crazy in my matches,” Lofthouse said. “At some points, it’s frustrating because you know you need to be doing it and you can tell you’re not. I’m working on getting past that.”
Team scoring
1. Iowa 79.5
2. Northwestern 71
3. Oklahoma 69
4. Edinboro 56
5. S. Illinois 47.5
Category: Wrestling
