Wrestling Claims Strong Finish Despite Injury

It might be easy to confuse the accomplishments of this year’s Harvard wrestlers with the Crimson’s achievements from a year ago.

Like the 2002 season, the star of this incarnation of the Crimson (6-8, 3-5 EIWA) was junior co-captain Jesse Jantzen (149 lbs.), who will be returning for the 2003-2004 season despite contemplating taking a year off to train for the 2004 Olympics. Jantzen once again placed third at the NCAA tournament, was a first team All-Ivy selection, was named an All-Ameican for the second consecutive year, won the Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association championship and was awarded Most Outstanding Wrestler and the award for hardest worker awards from his teammates.

Senior 174-pounder Pat O’Donnell qualified for NCAAs the two previous years by virtue of winning wild card berths at the EIWA tournament. O’Donnell lost his first bout at the national tournament, but won three straight in the consolation bracket to place in the top-12.

As far as stellar individual performances were concerned, the only thing that appeared to be missing was All-American Dawid Rechul ’02, who placed seventh last year as a heavyweight in the NCAA tournament.

But the team’s achievements were an entirely different matter this year given the number of injuries the Crimson incurred. The 2003 squad was greatly set back by injuries, especially at the heavier weights. Junior Max Odom (157 lbs.), who reinjured the same shoulder that forced him to miss the 2001-02 season, sophomore Dan Sirotkin and 197-pounder freshman Danny Jones all suffered season-ending injuries at the start of the year. Further besetting the Crimson was the loss of Reggie Lee ’03-04 (184 lbs.), who decided to take the past year off, but will join Jantzen as co-captain for the Crimson in the 2003-2004 campaign.

“I’ve never been through a season with that many injuries,” said Harvard coach Jay Weiss. “We didn’t reach the goals that we had had earlier in the season. But I’m happy with what we accomplished, considering the setbacks.”

Setbacks and streakiness thus defined Harvard’s season. The team opened with five straight losses, but picked up four victories, over Columbia, Sacred Heart, Brown and Boston University to close out the year.

Freshman Max Meltzer (133 lbs.) and senior Robert Griffin were the other two Crimson wrestlers to garner high honors this season. Meltzer was awarded the Most Promising Freshman award by his teammates, a second team All-Ivy selection by the league, and a fifth place finish at EIWA Championships. Griffin also finished fifth at EIWAs, and was an All-Ivy honorable mention along with classmate O’Donnell.

“One of the things I was real happy about was that we were peaking at just the right time [for the EIWA tournament at the end of the year],” Weiss said.

Harvard finished fifth among 13 eastern teams, in spite of those injuries. And just as the team rallied to win four meets after dropping its first five, wrestlers like Meltzer and Griffin improved considerably as the season wore on.

Harvard will be losing five seniors to graduation this year—David Germakian (125 lbs.), Griffin (157 lbs.), Seth Leighton (165 lbs.), heavyweight Joseph Linhart, co-captain Nick Picarsic (157 lbs.) and O’Donnell—making next year’s results dependent upon not only health but also growth from young wrestlers like freshman Mike Baria and Meltzer.

Despite the loss of this veteran contingent, the future appears bright for next year’s campaign—if all of the wrestlers this season are back up to full form.

“I’m expecting everyone to have a good rehab and make it back next year,” Weiss said.

—Staff writer Evan R. Johnson can be reached erjohns@fas.harvard.edu.