Harvard Wrestling Finishes Regular Season with Loss to Brown on Senior Night

On Friday night in Cambridge, Harvard (0-8, 0-5 Ivy) hosted Brown (1-8, 1-4 Ivy) for senior night to conclude regular season action as the Bears proved to be too much for the Crimson to handle, handing Harvard a 36-6 loss.

Though Harvard fell to Brown, there were a few standout Crimson performances, including a senior night victory for senior wrestler Cael Berg at 165 pounds, and a sudden victory win from sophomore Max Agresti at 197 pounds.

Due to the countless injuries to the Crimson squad, the dual began on a sour note, as Harvard was unable to fill the 125-pound weight class, giving Brown an early 6-0 lead in the team score due to the forfeit.

For the remainder of the lighter weights, Harvard struggled. In the 133-pound bout, freshman Logan Brzozowski wrestled hard, bringing the match to a sprint in the third period, but fell via decision 5-3. Brown extended their lead to 9-0.

After a pinfall in the 141-pound bout, Harvard sophomore Jaden Pepe came out to wrestle at 149 pounds. Following one takedown from each wrestler, Pepe was brought to his back twice in the second period. Impressively, he was able to avoid the pinfall, but going into the third period, Pepe trailed 13-3. Pepe wrestled well in the third period, but a flurry of takedowns from the sophomore proved to be just shy of what he needed to secure the victory. Pepe fell via decision 15-12 as Brown increased their lead to 18.

The final match before the break occurred in the 157-pound weight class, where a takedown to his back in the first period was too much to overcome for Harvard junior Jimmy Harrington. Harrington fought off of his back, but his comeback bid fell short, too, and he lost via decision 13-8, giving Brown an additional three team points.

Harvard came out of the break hot, with senior Cael Berg wrestling his final home wrestling match in the crimson and white. Berg got in on a sweep single in the first period, and finished the shot. After an escape from Brown’s Keegan Rothrock, Berg entered the second period with a 3-1 lead.

After escaping, Rothrock was able to get in on a shot of his own in the second period, but Berg channeled the energy in the Malkin Athletic Center and leveraged his four years of experience on the Harvard roster to fend off the attack with a tight whizzer and a defiant scramble.

In the third period, Berg chose neutral and got in on a low-single attack. Rothrock scrambled him into bad positioning, but Berg again was able to avoid being taken down, ending the scramble in a stalemate. At the end of the third period, Berg took Rothrock down again and won the match via decision 6-2. This put the Crimson on the board, now down 3-21.

“It means a lot; it’s such a special moment,” said Berg. “It meant more than just the win. I mean going out there I was just thinking about the last four years and everything the coaches have put into me and all the support my teammates have given me. I was pretty tired during that match, but that’s what kept me going. I could hear the crowd and hear my teammates get into it. I think in that moment when I was throwing that whizzer in I had something extra in me that came from them and everything we’ve gone through these last four years, so that was really pushing me.”

The 174-pound matchup featured freshman Haden Bottiglieri. Bottiglieri wrestled tough, and he was on the hunt for a third-period, match-tying takedown, but Drew Clearie of Brown was able to fend off his attacks and leveraged a forced shot from Bottiglier to grab the 15-8 win via decision, extending the Brown lead 24-3.

After escaping from a takedown in the first period of the 184-pound bout, senior Crimson wrestler Luke Rada found himself in poor positioning, getting caught in a cow catcher and being brought to his back. The turn was too tight, and Rada lost via pinfall giving Brown a 30-3 lead.

Harvard’s second victory of the evening came in the 197-pound weight class. Harvard sophomore Max Agresti fought through a grueling first three periods that featured an escape from each wrestler. With a 1-1 tie at the end of regulation, the match went into sudden victory: The next takedown decided the outcome of the match. Despite his exhaustion, Agresti fought through the bonus wrestling, and earned a takedown to win the match via 4-1 decision.

In the heavyweight matchup, featuring Harvard senior Jeffrey Crooks, a first-period mistake proved fatal as Crooks landed on his back, unable to recover. This ended the dual with a final score of 36-6 in Brown’s favor.

“There’s a lot of emotions when you’re a senior, and it’s the last time you’ll wrestle at home,” said Head Coach Jay Weiss. “We were in a lot of those bouts, but then something happened. I mean, we can’t let those ‘somethings’ happen.”

“We’ll get back to it. We’ll gear up for the Ivies,” he added. “We’ll train differently. I still think this team’s got some fight in them, and we’ll see what happens in the next couple of weeks. We’re excited.”

The Crimson wrestling team will be back in action on March 9 to begin the postseason at the inaugural Ivy League Championship in Princeton, NJ.

– Staff Writer Jude L. Stafford can be reached at jude.stafford@thecrimson.com