North Carolina
NCAA Championships
Carolina Wrestling NCAA Tournament Recap
March 25, 2002 | Wrestling
March 25, 2002
Led by Chris Rodrigues' All-American performance, the UNC wrestling team finished 37th at the 2002 NCAA Wrestling Championships in Albany, N.Y., on March 21-23. Rodrigues took eighth place at the tournament to be named an All-America at 125 pounds and was one of five wrestlers competing for Carolina, which totaled 10 points in the event.
Rodrigues lost to Cornell's Travis Lee 4-14 in Saturday morning's medal round to finish eighth but advanced to the seventh-place match by winning four bouts, including three over seeded opponents on Friday. He defeated Drexel's Rob Rebman 5-3 in his first bout on Friday and beat 10th-seeded A.J. Grant of Michigan in the second wrestleback.
Rodrigues then upset Minnesota's three-time All-America Leroy Vega, who was seeded No. 2 in the tournament, by a 3-2 decision.
Rodrigues advanced to pin 8th-seeded Shawn Williams of Oregon in 6:59, before suffering a 2-5 loss to 5th-seeded Ben VomBaur of Boise State in the fifth wrestleback.
Carolina's Matt Kenny (Hwt.) won his first wrestleback on Friday by decisioning UNC Greensboro's Greg Forbes 8-3 before falling to Illinois State's John Lockhart, 2-4.
Brad Byers (141 pounds) lost to Wisconsin's Grant Hoerr 3-6 in his second match of the tournament, while Evan Sola (133 pounds) lost a close 6-8 in overtime to Ohio's Anthony Carrizales.
Mark Canty (174 pounds) lost by pinfall in 5:52 to Cornell's Jim Stanec in his final match of the tournament.
On Thursday's first day of action, Kenny and Byers suffered narrow losses in their respective first round matches. Kenny lost to UPenn's Matt Feast 3-4, while Byers fell to Mike Maney of Lock haven, 1-3.
Rodrigues lost a 3-8 decision to Edinboro's Shawn Burch in his first match of the tournament, while Sola lost 5-11 to Michigan's Foley Dowd, the No. 8 seed in the weight class. Canty faced Michigan's Otto Olson, seeded No. 1 at 174 pounds, and lost by pinfall in 2:59.
