For the first time in the 59-year history of the program, four Pride wrestlers will be wearing the Hofstra colors in Saturday night's All-American parade as the 2007 NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships wrap up at the Palace.
The Pride, who concluded their championship competition Saturday afternoon in seventh place in the team standings, will finish in that position with the most Championships points in school history. In addition to the Pride's first-ever top 10 finish and their most points in the nationals, Hofstra also recorded four All-Americans with three wrestlers placing in the top five, both school firsts.
Saturday afternoon senior Chris Weidman, seeded 11th at 197, and junior Charles Griffin, seeded 11th at 141, placed third in their respective divisions. Weidman, now a two-time All-American after finishing sixth at last year's Championships, edged Cornell's fifth-seeded Jerry Rinaldi, 4-3 in the consolation semifinals Saturday before downing Ohio State's sixth-seeded J.D. Bergman, 9-4, in the third place match. Weidman finishes his year with a 5-1 NCAA Tournament record this year to boost his season record to 23-14 and his career record to 59-23.
Griffin also won twice Saturday morning, defeating CAA foe Don Fisch from Rider 6-5 in the consolation semifinals before beating Oklahoma State's third-seeded Nathan Morgan, who he lost to in the championship quarterfinals on Friday, 6-2, in the third place match. Griffin, who went 6-1 in the NCAA Championships this year, finished the year at 35-6 to boost his career record to 89-20.
Senior James Strouse was almost the Pride's third, third-place finisher, except for a judgment call by the match official in the third place match. Strouse, the third-seed at 157, defeated Minnesota's fourth-seeded C.P. Schlatter, 1-0, in the consolation semifinals to advance to face Illinois' fifth-seeded Michael Poeta in the third-place match. The two wrestlers went into overtime tied at 1-1 with the score remaining that way through sudden victory. In the first half of the first tie-breaker, Poeta rode out Strouse for the 30 second session. In the bottom half, Strouse held on to Poeta and appeared headed to a second sudden-victory period. But Poeta squirmed away from Strouse for an escape as time expired. Pride coach appealed the call but after a 30-minute review, the appeal was rejected. Strouse, who was 4-2 at the nationals, finished up the season with a 41-5 record and a 120-44 career record.
Senior Mike Patrovich, a two-time All-American, this year at 165, had two heart-breaking matches to place sixth in this year's Championships. The three-time CAA champion dropped a 5-4 decision to Missouri's ninth-seeded Matt Pell in the consolation semifinals before losing to Iowa State's fourth-seeded Travis Paulson, in the same waning seconds, in the fifth-place match by the same score. Patrovich, a four-time NCAA qualifier, was 3-3 at the 2007 Nationals to wrap up his season at 20-7 and his career at 106-30.
The NCAA Championships wrap up Saturday night with the finals in each of the 10 weight classes. The standings going into the finals are:
1- Minnesota 92.0
2- Iowa State 84.5
3- Missouri 76.0
4- Oklahoma State 69.0
5- Northwestern 67.5
6- Michigan 62.0
7- HOFSTRA 60.5
8- Ohio State 54.5
9- Penn State 54.0
10- Iowa 53.0
