Lehigh wrestling winning streak ends with loss to Penn State

One of these teams’ streaks had to come to an end, and ultimately it was Lehigh’s

The sixth-ranked Lehigh Mountain Hawks were defeated by the top ranked Penn State University Nittany Lions 28-9, ending the Hawks’ 10-match winning streak.

Lehigh’s first win was in the 141-pound weight class when 18th ranked Darien Cruz beat the Lions’ 14th ranked Jimmy Culibon.

“Beating a good kid here is a little confidence booster, and I’ll keep the momentum going into the postseason,” Randy Cruz said. “We’ve been preparing all year for the postseason, every match is a test, a milestone. The energy from the crowd got me hyped up. I’m glad I’m third match cause I sat through Darian (Cruz)’s match, kind of saw how it was. I put my headphones on got ready and 30 seconds left in Mason (Beckman)’s match I got focused and got the ball rolling.”

The Lehigh side of the record breaking 5909-person crowd went up in an uproar after the upset. However, the next win for the Mountain Hawks would not occur until the 184-pound weight class with third-ranked Nate Brown beating Penn State’s sixth-ranked Matt McCutcheon in a decision after three rounds of wrestling.

The Mountain Hawks third and final match win was when 14th ranked Max Wessell beat unranked Nick Nevills of Penn State in a 5-4 decision. Ian Brown lost his match to Penn State’s Jason Nolf by pinfall at 1:37 minute mark in the second period. Nolf is top ranked in the 157-pound weight class while Brown is unranked.

Another match was settled by technical fall, which is when a wrestler is out scored by 15 or more points in a match. Lehigh’s John Bolich, ranked 17th in the 197-pound weight class, lost to Penn State’s Morgan McIntosh, who is top ranked in the weight class.

One match was settled by major decision and all other matches were settled by decision, where a wrestler wins a match by up to eight points. It was a problem of playing defense as opposed to offense, according to coach Pat Santoro.

“Early in the evening I don’t think we were very aggressive,” coach Pat Santoro said. “Nate Brown dictated the pace a lot. We had a great opportunity in front of us to wrestle some great ranked people. We didn’t attack, and if you don’t attack you’re not going to beat a good wrestler. When you’re competing against a high-caliber wrestler you need to be able to pull the trigger. I didn’t think we were aggressive early on. After 149 we just went out and wrestled. Sometimes we were outmatched but we wrestled.”

Matches against higher ranked teams are important and are used as progress marks on seasons past and the remaining season to come.

“Its really important,” Drew Longo said. “You want to have the opportunity to wrestle the best guys in the country and you want to be able to prove yourself. You had almost 6,000 people in Stabler. This is big, and I think it is something for us to build off.”