No. 1 Penn State Rolls on with 10 Ranked Wrestlers

Gulibon moves to No. 9 at 133 after Scuffle finals run

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa.; January 7, 2014 – The top-ranked Penn State Nittany Lion wrestling team, fresh off its fourth-straight Southern Scuffle title, will roar into the heart of the Big Ten season with ten ranked wrestlers according to the latest Intermat release.  Head coach Cael Sanderson’s squad continues as the No. 1 ranked team in the latest Tournament Power Index (TPI) as well.

Penn State leads the TPI with 107.5 points, over ten ahead of second place Iowa’s 95.0.  Oklahoma State sits in third with 88.0.  The TPI ranks a team’s potential tournament strength based on Intermat’s individual rankings, not dual meet strength. The full list of national rankings is available at www.intermatwrestle.com.

Two-time All-American Nico Megaludis (Murrysville, Pa.) is ranked No. 3 at 125 with a 16-2 mark while red-shirt freshman Jimmy Gulibon (Latrobe, Pa.) jumped nine spots to No. 9 at 133.  Gulibon is coming off a 4-1 Scuffle that saw him advance to the finals with two top-ten wins and improve to 9-7 on the year.  True freshman Zain Retherford (Benton, Pa.) continues with the No. 2 spot at 141 with an unblemished 17-0 mark.  Junior Andrew Alton (Mill Hall, Pa.) is 3-0 and ranked No. 7 at 149. All-American Dylan Alton (Mill Hall, Pa.) is 6-0 and ranked No. 5 at 157.

Three-time All-American and Southern Scuffle Champion David Taylor (St. Paris, Ohio) is 17-0 and ranked No. 1 at 165 while junior All-American Matt Brown (West Valley City, Utah) is 17-1 and No. 3 at 174.  Three-time All-American Ed Ruth (Harrisburg, Pa.) is 16-1 and ranked No. 2 at 184 after suffering his first loss in 84 matches in the Scuffle title bout on Jan. 2.  Sophomore Morgan McIntosh (Santa Ana, Calif.) is 16-2 and ranked No. 8 at 197 while junior Jimmy Lawson (Tom’s River, N.J.) is 15-1 and ranked No. 12 at 285.

Penn State returns to action on Sunday, Jan. 12, when the Lions welcome Purdue to Rec Hall for an already sold-out 2 p.m. showdown, returning home for the first time in nearly a month.

With the full season of Rec Hall duals sold out prior to the start of the campaign, a very limited number of standing room only tickets are available to a few of the remaining Rec Hall duals.  People may purchase tickets by calling 1-800-NITTANY or by visiting the Penn State Athletics ticket office located in the BJC. Fans are encouraged to follow Penn State wrestling via twitter at www.twitter.com/pennstateWREST and on Penn State Wrestling’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/pennstatewrestling.   The 2013-14 Penn State Wrestling season is presented by The Family Clothesline.

 

 

Patrick Donghia

Penn State Wrestling Twitter:  http://twitter.com/pennstateWREST

Penn State Wrestling Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pennstatewrestling

Assistant Director of Athletics Communication

Ph: 814 865 1757 -- email: pad11@psu.edu