Penn State Open
Lewandowski Places Second at Nittany Lion Open
12/2/2012 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling
STATE COLLEGE, PA - Senior Mark Lewandowski rolled to a second-place finish on Sunday at the Nittany Lion Open, losing only to returning national champion David Taylor of Penn State in the 165-pound bracket final. It was Lewandowski's first loss of the season, snapping a 13-match win streak to start out the year. Three Bulls total placed in the top eight, with Max Soria finishing seventh at 125 pounds and Wally Maziarz placing eighth at 157 pounds.
Lewandowski opened with a 7-5 win over Geno Morelli of Pittsburgh and then shut out Scott Marmoll of North Carolina 7-0. In the quarterfinal match, he beat Penn State's Nick Fischer 4-1 to earn his place in the semifinals. There, he faced top-30 wrestler John Staudenmeyer of North Carolina and clawed out a 3-2 win to make the finals. He was eventually pinned in the third round by Taylor, the 2011-12 Hodge Trophy winner as the nation's top wrestler, but was able to secure the team's top finish of the day.
Soria lost his opening round match but a pair of forfeits vaulted him into the third round of the consolation bracket. He beat Will Mason of Virginia 7-1 and then bested Ohio State's Nick Roberts 5-2. He lost his match to Rob Deutsch for the chance at the fifth place bout, but rebounded to beat Robert Montoya of Campbell 8-3 to claim seventh.
Maziarz entered the day as the team leader in wins for the season, with 13, and he again had a busy day. He won his first two matches, 9-2 over Ron Vaughters of Bloomsburg and 7-0 over John Keck of Navy, before losing to Nestor Taffur of Boston in the quarterfinals. He would win two more matches in the consolations before losses to Scott Winston of Rutger and Taffur again would put him in eighth place.
The main portion of the tournament schedule now complete, the team will open the dual season with a Mid-American Conference match against the Central Michigan Chippewas. The match will be a historic one for the program, as it will be the one-thousandth dual meet in the program's storied history that dates back to 1934. The team hopes to celebrate the occasion with an upset of the 12th-ranked Chippewas for its first dual win ever in the series.
