PITTSBURGH – The Virginia wrestling team (9-8, 1-5 ACC) closed out the conference slate on Friday night (Feb. 20), falling at No. 15 Pitt (11-4, 3-3 ACC) by a score of 37-0.
NOTING THE HOOS
- Two weight classes went to extra time with Wynton Denkins at 149 and Michael Murphy at 165 battling into overtime against nationally-ranked opponents. Denkins fell in the tiebreak rounds, while Murphy fell in the sudden victory round.
- No. 22 Keyveon Roller’s match was decided by riding time with the Virginia wrestler dropping the 2-1 decision.
- Virginia will return to action in two weeks when the Cavaliers compete at the ACC Championships hosted by Virginia Tech (March 8)
FROM HEAD COACH STEVE GARLAND
“To say we are disappointed with the way we ended the regular season is an understatement. And performance is absolutely unacceptable and obviously it starts with me. We’re going to be making some serious changes heading into the ACC tournament. We had two overtime matches that we lost late. We’ve got to get those. We lost a really close one at 125 where strategy was key; we got out smarted and that can’t happen. At 141 pounds we made some mistakes that really cost early us, but the fight was there with Kyren. Our other guys showed no urgency. Again, I need to help the make the changes in a short amount of time. The ACC tournament is right around the corner. Our staff will do everything we can from now until then to help our guys improve.”
No. 15 PITT 37, VIRGINIA 0
184: No. 27 Chase Kranitz major dec. Griffin Gammell, 11-1 – Pitt 4, UVA 0
197: No. 9 Mac Stout major dec. Steven Burrell Jr., 13-2 – Pitt 8, UVA 0
285: No. 15 Dayton Pitzer dec. Brenan Morgan, 7-1 – Pitt 11, UVA 0
125: Tyler Chappell dec. No. 22 Keyveon Roller, 2-1 - Pitt 14, UVA 0
133: No. 26 Evan Tallmadge by forfeit – Pitt 20, UVA 0
141: Anthony Santaniello dec. Kyren Butler, 13-8 – Pitt 23, UVA 0
149: No. 23 Kade Brown dec. Wynton Denkins, 6-1 (TB-1) – Pitt 26, UVA 0
157: No. 19 Dylan Evans major dec. No. 30 Colton Washleski, 13-2 – Pitt 30, UVA 0
165: No. 32 Jared Keslar dec. Michael Murphy, 4-1 (sv-1) – Pitt 33, UVA 0
174: No. 15 Luca Augustine major dec. No. 32 Nick Hamilton, 12-1 – Pitt 37, UVA 0