Wrestling Drops Three Weekend Matches Against Conference Foes

Harvard wrestling saw a tough road trip this past weekend (1-7, 0-6 EIWA), as the squad fell to Lehigh as well as Ivy League foes Princeton and Penn. Injuries continue to plague the Crimson as it goes into its last leg of dual-meet season.

“Our guys wrestled hard but we came up on the wrong side of a lot of things,” senior heavyweight David Ng said. “There’s nothing that practice can’t fix as we finish up this year.”

HARVARD 12, PRINCETON 21

Harvard fell short against the Tigers (), losing 21-12. Starting with a forfeit in the 125 weight class, the Crimson was unable to close the deficit and regain the lead.

A highlight for the team came from captain James Fox, who notched a personal win against No. 10 ranked Abram Ayala in a matchup that Fox has seen several times over his collegiate career.

“Those two have met so many times, and [Ayala] really knows how to wear James down and get him tired,” Ng said. But James really stepped up, and kept fighting and got a takedown in the last 20 seconds.”

No. 15 ranked junior captain Todd Preston also contributed a win for the team, as he outmaneuvered Princeton’s 141-pounder, Jordan Laster, 5-0.

“Todd wrestled really hard,” Ng said. “He beat a pretty tough guy at home, and that really got our bench and crowd really excited, and got a lot of energy going for us.”

The last two wins on the day came from Ng and rookie Josef Johnson. Ng picked up a decision over the Tigers’ Ray O’Donnell in the heavyweight division, while newcomer Johnson continued his strong season performance with a tight win over Judd Zeigler, 7-6.

For three Harvard wrestlers—Devon Gobbo, Patrick Hogan, and Josh Popple—this was their first weekend back from injury after a few weeks off the mat.

“Its tough, we’ve had those three guys come back from injuries, so we knew it was going to be difficult for them, getting right back in it,” Crimson coach Jay Weiss said. “But it was good for them to get in matches.”

HARVARD 13, PENN 26

The same day, Harvard continued with a match against Ivy League foe Penn (6-4, 2-1), and repeated last years performance in the Crimson’s second consecutive loss.

“Obviously we aren’t pleased with results,” Weiss said. “We just need to compete harder. That’s all it comes down to. We wrestled better against Penn, but having to give it up at 125 pounds certainly doesn’t help the cause. We need to take our training into competition.”

In the matchup against their respective Quaker opponents, Fox, Preston, and Ng repeated their winning performances, while junior Devon Gobbo contributed a win of his own.

The most notable performance came from Fox, who earned a decision against the Penn’s Canaan Bethea, in a hard fought match that went to three overtime periods.

“He had already shown toughness against Princeton, and he just showed that grit again against Penn,” Ng said. “Going into triple overtime and being able to pull out a win like that is huge.”

HARVARD 3, LEHIGH 36

The Crimson headed to Lehigh (11-4, 7-1) on Sunday, rounding out the weekend with a third away match.

Preston put Harvard on the scoreboard with a hard fought victory over No. 20 Randy Cruz, taking the win 2-0.

“Preston had the match in control, and I think he made a mistake that caught him,” Weiss said. “He’s doing well and he did a good job this weekend but he knows that he’s not where he needs to be for the end of the year. But he has some time to figure that out.”

Harvard would not score again for the rest of the contest.

“I think that we have a young team right now,” Ng said. “We have a lot of injuries and starters who aren’t in the lineup, so we have a lot of freshman and sophomores who going out that aren’t used to being in that starting position. Its tough for them because they’re fighting as hard as they can, but it just takes time and experience.”

—Staff writer Jillian Dukes can be reached at jdukes01@college.harvard.edu