The Iowa wrestlers took a page out of their basketball counterparts this week, absolutely taking it to Minnesota in a 34-7 rout of the Gophers in Iowa City.
Brandon Sorensen got Iowa off to a hot start at 149, falling Ben Brancale early on. Michael Kemerer came back after sitting out against Michigan, and didn’t appear to miss a beat taking a major decision over Jake Short to give Iowa the first two matches.
Alex Marinelli and Joey Gunther then took care of business to give Iowa the first four matches and an early 16-0 lead.
The Hawkeyes didn’t suffer the same fate as last week after establishing an early lead. Mitch Bowman got rode out for most of the second period against Brandon Krone to drop his match, but Cash Wilcke and Samuel Stoll rebounded to put it away for Iowa.
Spencer Lee is still a destroyer of worlds; he absolutely dominated Ethan Lizak — a top-10 wrestler and the NCAA runner-up at 125 from a year ago. Lee toyed with Lizak it seemed; he had a takedown and four backs in the first period. He followed that up with a reversal, four backs and a stall in the second and a takedown in the third. Lizak was not having fun.
And that wasn’t even the match of the night. With the win already sealed, Carter Happel took the mat against Tommy Thorn. With just two seconds left and down 4-3 in the match, Happel pinned Thorn, locking up a fall.
Full match results can be found below:
125: Spencer Lee over Ethan Lizak (TF 15-0 5:46)
133: Mitch McKee over Paul Glynn (Dec 7-2)
141: Carter Happel over Thomas Thorn (Fall 6:58)
149: Brandon Sorensen over Benjamin Brancale (Fall 3:32)
157: Michael Kemerer over Jake Short (MD 16-6)
165: Alex Marinelli over Nicholas Wanzek (Dec 5-1)
174: Joseph Gunther over Christopher Pfarr (Dec 5-1)
184: Brandon Krone over Mitchell Bowman (MD 12-2)
197: Cash Wilcke over Dylan Anderson (Dec 10-7)
285: Samuel Stoll over Rylee Streifel (MD 12-1)
Up next Iowa takes on Northwestern on Sunday at 10AM, for some reason.