After getting trounced by league rival Cornell to start off Saturday, the Lions’ wrestling team traveled to Binghamton and defeated the Bearcats 24-15. Early in the day, the Light Blue competed in its first league match against 15th-ranked Cornell and did not play up to the Big Red’s level.
Brandon Kinney, a co-captain, started the match off with a victory in his bout against Mike Rodriguez. Scoreless after the first period, he gained a point for an escape and secured the win with a two-point takedown in the final period.
However, the lead was short-lived as Cornell took eight of the final nine bouts. Jerome Greco fell by major decision to Mike Grey, who is ranked second in the country, and the Lions continued to drop bouts until Matt Dunn defeated Matt Easter.
Dunn earned an escape to start the second period and with 29 seconds remaining, scored a two-point takedown to take the match 3-2. The team then dropped the final five matches.
Later in the day at Binghamton, Columbia jumped out to a 6-1 lead behind victories by Brandon Kinney and Jerome Greco. Kinney, who has led the Lions all season, decisioned Tyler Malmberg 9-5. The Bearcats surged back, taking the next two bouts at the 141 and 149 weight classes.
Trailing 9-6, Matt Dunn evened the score at 9 for the Light Blue and Joe Kushnerick put the Lions up after beating Brett Nelson, who was Dunn’s opponent, as well.
Though Mike Wolfer was pinned, forfeiting the lead, the Lions still managed to pick up the wins necessary to take home the victory and secure a split in the day’s matches.
Columbia was pinned twice but won seven of the ten total bouts to push its record to 4-5.
This week, Columbia will again have a double day as on Friday it travels to Penn to take on the Quakers at 2 p.m. The Light Blue then goes across Philadelphia to battle Drexel at 6:30 p.m. The team will play its second league match of the weekend when, on Saturday, it travels to Princeton to go toe-to-toe with the Tigers.
Penn won its first two league bouts over the weekend, defeating Harvard and Brown, while Princeton fell to the same opponents.