Sports

College Wrestling Fans Left Angry And Confused Over Controversial NCAA Tournament Brackets

#College Wrestling
by

Getty Image


While the rest of the sports world focuses on March Madness, college wrestling fans will spend the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament off in their own little world.

That’s because they’ve got March Matness, the annual NCAA Wrestling Tournament, which takes place at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, Missouri.

The NCAA released its brackets for the event on Wednesday, and fans had plenty to say about several controversial seeds.

The biggest cause of consternation came at the 174-pound weight class, where Penn State senior Carter Starocci is looking to become just the sixth four-time NCAA champion.

Starocci spent the entire season ranked No. 1 in the country. But an injury caused him to forfeit out of the Big Ten Tournament, giving him two losses on his record.

Staorcci then both left and returned to the Penn State team within a 48-hour span. But the seeding committee did not look kindly on him dropping out of the conference tournament.

The would-be one seed dropped all the way to No. 9, giving him a potential quarterfinal match with top-seeded Mekhi Lewis of Virginia Tech.

That alone was enough to draw ire, but fans also felt it was unfair to Lewis. A former national champion in his own right at 165 pounds, the Hokies’ star is undefeated on the year but 0-2 in his career against Starocci, including an 11-0 victory to Starocci in an All-Star exhibition to start the 2023-24 season.

Michigan’s Shane Griffith, another former NCAA champion at 165 pounds, is also on the same side of the bracket as the No. 4 seed.

But that was far from the only issue fans had with the brackets. At 133-pounds, former NCAA finalist and seventh-year senior Daton Fix landed the top seed. But redshirt freshman Ryan Crookham also went undefeated and twice beat reigning champion Vito Arujau during the season.

When Fix’s Oklahoma State team met up with Crookham’s Lehigh team, the Cowboys’ star did not wrestle.

Yet Crookham was handed the two seed.

Ultimately, you’ve got to wrestle whoever’s in front of you. But the seeding committee certainly didn’t make any fans with some of their decisions.