Three Virginia Tech wrestlers reached All-American status at the 2021 NCAA Wrestling Championships, but as a team, the Hokies finished a disappointing 15th in the final team scores.
Here are the team scores:
Korbin Myers (4th place at 133 pounds), Sam Latona (6th place at 125 pounds), and Hunter Bolen (7th place at 184 pounds) were the Hokie All-Americans.
Myers, seeded No. 3 in the 133-pound weight class, came in fourth to finish off a strong senior season that saw him go 11-1 leading up to the Championships. Myers' season came after he missed all of 2019-2020 with an injury. He was featured in one of a handful of "Dear Wrestling" letters that were included on the NCAA Wrestling Twitter feed:
https://twitter.com/ncaawrestling/status/1372714268878118912
Redshirt freshman Sam Latona came in as the No. 2 seed but ran into a wrestler he couldn't handle in 7 seed Taylor LaMont from Utah Valley. LaMont beat Latona 7-4 in the quarterfinals, and they later met in the 5th-place matchup in the wrestlebacks, where LaMont beat Latona again, 4-1.
Hunter Bolen was seeded No. 5 and nearly wrestled to his seed, finishing 7th.
Overall, the Hokies had five top-eight seeds, and none of them wrestled to seed, though Myers and Bolen came close. In addition to Myers, Latona, and Bolen, the Hokies had Bryce Andonian seeded No. 6 at 149 pounds. He was beaten 8-3 by the 3 seed in the quarterfinals, and then lost his first match in the wrestlebacks to the 17 seed.
Most disappointing of all was the outcome for 4 seed Mekhi Lewis, the defending champion at 165 pounds, who had to withdraw after his second match because of the injury he suffered dating back to the final dual meet of the season against Pittsburgh. Lewis came into the Championships armored up like a cyborg in an effort to protect his injury:
But it wasn't enough, and Lewis was still clearly injured. He won his first match against Brian Meyer of Lehigh 8-3 without severe distress, but in the next match against 13 seed Tanner Skidgel of Navy, Lewis was in agony. He took a full injury timeout at one point, then gutted out a narrow 3-2 decision to close out his Thursday.
Here's Lewis, in pain after his win over Skidgel:
https://twitter.com/ncaawrestling/status/1372722994548633603
On Friday morning, Virginia Tech wasted no time announcing that Lewis couldn't go on and was withdrawing:
https://twitter.com/HokiesWrestling/status/1372915951625248773
Had Lewis been healthy and able to wrestle to his seed, that would have pushed the Hokies as a team into the top ten, even with everything else that went on.
Here are the results for Virginia Tech's other wrestlers in the Championships:
- 157: 27 seed Connor Brady went 0-2, losing to the 6 seed and 22 seed.
- 174: 27 seed Dakota Howard went 0-2, losing to the 6 seed and 22 seed.
- HWT: 18 seed Hunter Catka went 1-2, losing to the 15 seed, defeating the 31 seed, and losing to the 17 seed.
For the 2021 Virginia Tech Wrestling team, the highlights were winning the ACC Dual Meet Championship, the stellar season of Korbin Myers, and the promising debuts of several freshmen. The Hokies know they have much work to do, but they also have a young team and a lot of talented wrestlers.
