It was a huge weekend for NYU’s wrestling team, as the Grapplers sent representatives to two separate events: the Centennial Conference Championship hosted by McDaniel College in Westminster, Maryland and the University Athletic Association Championship in Cleveland, Ohio. In Cleveland, the Grapplers were looking to continue their run of excellence by winning their fifth straight UAA Championship.

NYU elected to send most of their top wrestlers to the UAA, rather than the CCC, so they weren’t expected to blow away the competition, like usual. But the Grapplers went in with victory on their mind as they faced off against schools such as Stevens Institute of Technology, the United States Merchant Marine Academy, Johns Hopkins University, Muhlenberg College, Washington and Lee University and Gettysburg College.

Sophomore Austin Day shined with junior Nathan Pike absent. After losing his first bout, he won his next three bouts — one by fall against Brandon Tran of Johns Hopkins and two by decision over Yoseph Borai of Stevens (9-7) and Gettysburg’s Jake Bracken (7-5) — securing himself third place at 133 pounds. Freshman grappler Ian Burke, wrestling at 149 pounds, performed well enough to check in at fourth, and Senior Kyzen Smith at 197 pounds reached the consolation semifinals of his respective division.

However, these individual accomplishments did not amount to much, as the Violets put up only 30.5 points as a team. Although they had come into the tournament in third place in the Centennial this season, the team walked away with only a seventh place finish. First place went to Stevens, who put up an impressive 121 points. Day, confident even in the face of lackluster results, was still pleased with the Violets’ second unit.

“We had a split squad and our starters were in Chicago, so to come into this tournament with younger, less experienced guys and still place seventh shows a lot about our team depth and is a testament to the competition within our room,” Day said. “We had three freshmen place top four which is a good indicator for next year and the next few years.”

Meanwhile in Cleveland, NYU secured its fifth straight UAA Championship. The Grapplers were led by UAA Most Outstanding Wrestler John Messinger, who had a 16-6 major decision over Case Western’s Nick Leez. The team started the day with a 36-12 victory over Case Western. Their battle against them started with a clean sweep of the first seven matches, which ran from 125 pounds to 174. It was only in the eighth match at 184 pounds that Western notched its first victory.

The rest of the day continued in the same fashion for both Messinger and the Grapplers, as his 4-3 decision over Chicago’s Paul Papoutsis paved the way for the team’s eventual 22-16 victory over Chicago — a much closer victory than the one prior, but still one well deserved. The Grapplers take to the mat next on Thursday, Feb. 18 to face off against the College of Mount Saint Vincent and host school LIU-Post in Brookville, New York.

A version of this article appeared in the Feb. 16 print edition. Email Kyle Ryan at [email protected].