Wrestling Wins Pair, Slips vs. No. 17 Cornell

Despite wrestling at home for the first time all year, Harvard could not find a way to beat last year's co-Ivy champions. BOSTON COLLEGE  9 HARVARD  30 CORNELL  25 HARVARD  12 COLUMBIA  9 HARVARD  24

But despite Harvard's (7-5-0, 2-2-0 Ivy) strong showing against Cornell (13-2-1, 3-0-1 Ivy), the Crimson fell short 25-12.

However, dominating victories over Boston College (1-11) and Columbia (10-4-1) left the wrestlers with much to build on as the final and most important weeks of the season approach.

The home debut began on Friday afternoon as the Crimson thumped B.C., 30-9 at the Malkin Athletic Center.

Stepping in at the 133-pound class, freshman Brandon Rhoades started the pounding with his 11-9 win. At 141 pounds, Damien Billow crushed his opponent, 19-7, while tri-captain Joel Friedman brought his match to a speedy end at 149 pounds with a technical fall at 4:30.

Likewise, junior Kevin Kurtz, who had a thrilling overtime victory last week at Penn, went for an early finish at 157 pounds with a pin at 2:32.

The most exciting match of the meet occurred in the 165-pound weight class as junior Tom Kiler scored the winning takedown to go ahead 6-4 with 50 seconds remaining in the third period. Rounding out Harvard's win were the decisive 18-3 and 18-8 victories by sophomore Adam Truitt at 174 pounds and freshman Andy Kalman at 184 pounds.

"The freshmen showed an amazing effort. They literally did stuff we worked on at practice," Harvard Coach Jay Weiss said. "I am really pleased with those guys."

Although the afternoon seemed too easy for the Crimson, things certainly changed that evening when it squared off against No. 17 Cornell.

Much like last weekend's match-up against Penn, the Crimson had some terrific individual performances but fell short in the overall duel.

"It was a close bout, but we wrestled tired," Weiss said.

At 133 pounds, sophomore Matt Picarsic had a great match, thoroughly outwrestling Big Red senior tri-captain Nate Rupp for an 8-3 win. It was sweet revenge for Picarsic, who was defeated by Rupp in the semi-finals of last year's conference tournament.

Senior tri-captain Dustin DeNunzio, ranked No. 7 in the nation, picked up where Picarsic left off and showed no mercy in the 141-pound weight class. In control for all three periods, DeNunzio easily secured a victory over junior Ben New, ranked No. 17.

For the second week in a row, Kurtz pulled out a thrilling overtime win in the 157-pound class. With a score of 1-1 going into overtime, Kurtz and junior Leo Urbinelli found themselves deadlocked after the additional two minutes of wrestling.

In the additional thirty seconds of sudden death, in which a coin-toss winner gets to choose to be on top or bottom, Kurtz was able to escape Urbinelli for a 2-1 win.

Another highlight for the Crimson was the performance of junior tri-captain Fran Volpe at 184 pounds. Although he won 4-2, the score didn't reflect his complete domination over Big Red senior Ottie Pendleton the entire match.

At 197 pounds, Brad Soltis put up a great fight against senior Bob Greenleaf, bringing the match to 4-4 in the third period to send it to overtime, before falling 6-4.

"We fought well as a team," said DeNunzio. "We wrestled hard but fell a little short."

Although the Crimson was unable to pull out the final victory over Cornell, its next Ivy opponent wouldn't be so lucky. Even after a physically and mentally fatiguing day on Friday, the Crimson was still able to garner a 24-9 victory over Columbia.

"We wrestled well but a few matches were closer than they should have been," Picarsic said. "We had to stay focused coming back from a hard loss."

At 133 pounds, Picarsic's reversal move during sudden death handed his opponent a 3-1 defeat and capped off his successful weekend. DeNunzio had no problem handling his opponent at 141-pounds and easily cruised to a 14-4 win.

In a close match at 149 pounds, Friedman turned on the heat in the third period to earn the 1-0 victory. Wrestling at 165 pounds, Kurtz completed his perfect weekend with a 3-2 win, as did Volpe, who dismantled his foe 11-2 in the 184-pound class.

After his heartbreaking loss the night before, Soltis came out strong at 197 pounds and won his match, 7-6. And finally, freshman Dawid Rechul put the final stamp on the beating with his 15-1 thrashing at heavyweight.

The team is entering its final weekend of dual meets and will host Brown on Friday night and B.U. Saturday night. After beating Brown for the first time last season, the grapplers hope to forge a winning tradition. Weiss also used to coach for the Bears.

"Brown is a big match. They have a lot of talented wrestlers," Picarsic said. "We need to wrestle well."