Penn State’s wrestling lineup the biggest question mark heading into Sunday’s Hofstra dual

The week of a dual, Penn State always sends out notes, which lists its probable starters.

In past years, the probable starters remained consistent because the Nittany Lions usually already had a couple of duals under their belts. But, because it’s an Olympic-qualifying year, this season is unique. Penn State has had two tournaments but is only coming off its first dual of the year — last weekend’s 30-10 win over Lehigh — in preparation of Sunday’s dual with Hofstra.

Now, tie in the fact the U.S. Senior Nationals are going on next week, and that puts a wrench into things.

The U.S. Senior Nationals is one of the last few chances a wrestler has of making the Olympic Team Trials. The top four finishers at Senior Nationals advance to the trials.

“With the trials being here in State College, we got a lot of kids that want to participate and wrestle in that,” Nittany Lions coach Cael Sanderson said Tuesday.

Last week, Sanderson said that the lineup “definitely” would be affected for the dual against the Pride. However, he is worried that his team doesn’t have a whole lot of matches at this point in the year.

So, who will don the Blue and White singlet?

On Tuesday, Sanderson said that Robert Howard wouldn’t be out there, so that leaves Gary Steen and Braeden Davis as options at 125 pounds.

Aaron Nagao and Beau Bartlett were listed as the wrestlers to go at 133 and 141, respectively. Both have had successful stints so far on the international stage. Bartlett earned a Junior Pan American title in 2018; Nagao was on the U23 World Team last year and had a fifth-place finish at the U23 World Championships.

With the news of Shayne Van Ness being done for the season, Tyler Kasak is listed at 149 pounds. He was a U17 World silver medalist last year and was this year’s U20 National freestyle champion. One might think that if Kasak is the replacement for Van Ness, then he’ll forgo Senior Nationals to get more matches under his freshman belt.

There might be a little clarity at 157 pounds as Levi Haines said on Tuesday that he’s “not really sure” if he’s going to the Senior Nationals. Haines didn’t look like himself in the dual against Lehigh, where he earned a 12-6 decision.

“I just had a couple of things going on, and just coming back from it,” he said. “It’s just like you said, ‘knocking the rust off a little bit.’ It felt good to score some points. I got scored on a little bit. Sometimes you give up some points to score some points. I’m not disappointed in my performance by any means. I feel like I gave my best effort with what I had.”

Added Sanderson: “He’s been off the mat. There’s no excuses, but his opponent came out and got a takedown, so props to him. He (Haines) just didn’t have the same look in his eye and same body language. We discuss all those things. He hadn’t made scratch yet; that was his first time making weight. When you look back on it, you just think, ‘Hey, Levi is just a Superman-robot guy.’ He still gives a great effort. You could tell he didn’t feel great, but he still found a way to finish strong.”

At 165 pounds, Mitchell Mesenbrink wowed the Rec Hall crowd last Sunday, but he’s had quite the success on the international level too. After finishing with a silver in the U20 World Championships in 2022, he came away with the gold in this year’s World Championships.

Carter Starocci has proclaimed how much he wants to be an Olympic champion, so one would think he’ll be headed to Senior Nationals. There isn’t much out there about Bernie Truax and Olympic wrestling, so he might be out there on Sunday.

Aaron Brooks could be back in the lineup against Hofstra as he missed the Lehigh dual. He has no real reason to be at the Senior Nationals, unless to be a warmup partner for someone.

Brooks has already secured a spot in the Olympic Team Trials by winning the U23 World Championships in October.

Greg Kerkvliet, who would have faced the Pride’s No. 21 Keaton Kluever, stated last week that he was heading to the Senior Nationals. Unless something changed from then to now, there will be a new face at 285.

In the end, no matter who steps on the mat for the Nittany Lions, Sanderson said they’ll be prepared and focused.

“We prepare for every opponent the same,” he said. “Hofstra has got a lot of tradition. A match is a match. We want to wrestle at our best regardless of who we’re competing against.

“Ultimately, that’s the way we approach things. We’re not necessarily competing against our opponents. We’re trying to be at our best all the time, so that’s a different standard. I think it’s a higher standard, so that’s what we strive for. We don’t really change our approach in any way. We just try to be consistent throughout.”

Hofstra (0-1) at No. 1 Penn State (1-0)

When: 1 p.m., Sunday

Where: Rec Hall

Radio: WOWY (103.1 FM)

Online: Radio, Lionvision at GoPSUsports.com; Video, Big Ten+ (paid subscription)

Twitter: @byncobler, @pennstatewrest