Rutgers wrestling gets a major recruit from Pennsylvania in Conner Harer

Steven Falk, Asbury Park Press
·4 min read
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Rutgers University wrestling coach Scott Goodale has received commitments for both this coming season and the future in the last two days.

It's another BOOM! recruit for the Rutgers University wrestling program - to borrow the phrase coach Scott Goodalein used on social media.

Highly regarded Montgomery (Pennsylvanai) junior Conner Harer middle weight announced Thursday night on Instragram he will wrestle for Rutgers beginning with the 2024-25 season.

Harer, ranked No. 6 in the nation at 152 pounds by flowrestling.org, is a two-time PIAA Class AA champion.

He won at 152 this past season and at 145 in 2022. Harer was the PIAA Class AA fifth-place finisher at 133 in 2021.

Harer went 49-1 this past season, is 96-1 the past two seasons and 136-5 for his career.

Last weekend, Harer won the 152-pound championship at the National High School Coaches Association (NHSCA) Junior Nationals in Virginia Beach, Va. He majored St. Peter’s Prep’s two-time NJSIAA top five finisher Jonathan Fuller 8-0 in the final.

Harer should give Rutgers a needed boost in the middle weights when he arrives. Even though three of Rutgers’ four wrestlers from 149-174 qualified for the NCAA Tournament, the Scarlet Knights need to improve at those weights in the future.

They won just one bout at the national tournament at those weights and none of those wrestlers finished higher than seventh in the Big Ten Tournament. Two of those wrestlers qualified for the NCAA Tournament through the ninth and 11th-place brackets in the Big Ten Tournament.

Rutgers also went a combined 7-25 (6-25 on the mat) from 149-174 during Big Ten dual meets.

Harer’s brother, Brandt won the 120-pound freshman championship at the NHSCA Freshman nationals.

Harer’s commitment followed on the heels of the news late last week that Southern Regional junior 150-pound NJSIAA champion Matt Henrich had reopened his recruiting after he had committed to Rutgers last fall.

Boone McDermott enters transfer portal

Redshirt junior Boone McDermott, Rutgers’ starting heavyweight the last two seasons, entered the transfer portal late last week, according to Flowrestling.org.

Pat Mineo of the Wrestling Room Facebook forum was the first to report the news.

McDermott’s decision could open the door for P.J. Casale to be the Scarlet Knights’ starter at heavyweight next season. Bringing in a transfer is also a possibility.

Casale, the NJSIAA 220-pound champion in 2020 when he was at Delbarton and the runner-up at 215 in 2022 when he was at Passaic Valley, redshirted this past season.

His only action came in the Princeton Open last November. He went 3-1 in that tournament. The defeat was to Princeton’s NCAA qualifier Travis Stefanik.

McDermott, who was a National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) champion in 2020 at Iowa Central, was an NCAA qualifier this past season. He went 0-2 in the national tournament as the No. 24 seed after he finished eighth as the No. 6 seed in the Big Ten Tournament.

He was sidelined for much of the second half of the regular season due to a knee injury he sustained against Rider on Jan. 8. He missed the Scarlet Knights’ first five Big Ten matches and only wrestled in two of the Scarlet Knights' eight conference matches.

In McDermott’s absence, Rutgers used John O’Donnell and 197-pounder Kyle Epperly at heavyweight. They both went 0-3 against top opposition The two combined to give up a pin or technical fall in five of those six bouts. McDermott won both his Big Ten dual-meet bouts against Maryland and Nebraska.

McDermott’s biggest dual-meet moment came when his 5-3 win over Stefanik in the final bout gave Rutgers a win over Princeton on criteria last Dec. 11 at Princeton’s Jadwin Gymnasium. He was 16-7 on the season and 8-0 in dual meets.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Rutgers wrestling lands Conner Harer, heralded recruit