Lehigh set to kick off 2005-06 season at wrestle-offs
10/31/2005 7:00:00 PM | Men's Wrestling
“I’m really looking forward to them (the wrestle-offs),” said eleventh year Lehigh head coach Greg Strobel, Monday on the Lehigh Sports Magazine television show. “It’s always a lot of fun because we know we are going to win. I get to visit with a lot of the fans at Grace Hall and take notes on how the team is wrestling.”
Tuesday night’s event will feature 12 bouts, including three exhibition bouts. Several intriguing battles will be at least temporarily settled on Tuesday night, including a three-way race for the starting job at 149 pounds. In Tuesday’s opening bout, sophomore Dave Nakasone will wrestle-off against deferred freshman Trevor Chinn, with the winner coming back later in the evening to wrestle junior Matt Ciasulli who has moved up two weight classes from last season.
Another highly contested battle is at 125, where sophomore Patrick Berger will square off against true freshman Matt Fisk, who comes to Lehigh as
A pair of juniors will collide at 197 for the right to replace former All-American Jon Trenge. Matt Cassidy was the starter in 2003-04, when Trenge took his Olympic deferral year. He will take on Paul Weibel, who competed as a heavyweight his first two seasons but will move down to his more natural weight.
“The wrestle-offs provide a good chance for some of the kids to wrestle in front of our large home crowd,” Strobel said. “We will have some very good matches.”
Here’s a weight by weight breakdown of Tuesday night’s probable match-ups:
Weight | ||||
125 | Matt Fisk (Fr.) | vs. | Patrick Berger (So.) | |
141 | Cory Cooperman (Sr.) | vs. | Frankie Gayeski (Fr.) | |
141 | Matt Ennis (Jr.) | vs. | Phil Koehler (So.) | Exhibition |
149 | Trevor Chinn (Fr.) | vs. | Dave Nakasone (So.) | |
149 | Matt Ciasulli (Jr.) | vs. | Chinn-Nakasone winner | |
157 | Derek Zinck (Sr.) | vs. | Matt Anderson (Jr.) | |
165 | Troy Letters (Sr.) | vs. | Mike Galante (Fr.) | |
174 | Manuel Schubert (Fr.) | vs. | Samir Soriano (Fr.) | Exhibition |
184 | Dave Helfrich (Jr.) | vs. | Brian LaMay (Sr.) | |
184 | Jon Bruno (Jr.) | vs. | Exhibition | |
197 | Matt Cassidy (Jr.) | vs. | Paul Weibel (Jr.) | |
285 | Tom Curl (Jr.) | vs. | Dan Murrer (So.) |
The Wrestle-Offs get underway at 7:00 from the Leeman-Turner Arena at Grace Hall. For tickets, fans should call (610) 7LU-GAME or stop by the Lehigh Ticket Office located in Grace Hall.
