| Sanders Freed has adjusted well to his role as OSU's starting
177-pounder. Freed, seeded fourth at Pac-10s, dropped the third
place match to Cal Poly's Michael French after a frustrating
third period that started with Freed trailing 2-1. French chose
the down position and Freed spent over a minute trying to flip
him for back points; after cutting French loose for an escape
that made it 3-1 with 47 seconds left, Freed was unable to catch
French for a takedown. "He ran away from me for 1:15 and there
was no stalling call, no nothing - it was ridiculous," Freed
(19-17) said. "There's nothing you can do in that situation if
you need a takedown. I made one mistake, getting taken down in
the first period, and that turned out to be the match." Freed
qualified for his first trip to the NCAA meet earlier with a
5-4 decision over Stanford's Tim Kendall. After dropping to 177
for the ASICS Oregon Wrestling Classic held Dec. 28-29, Freed
was 11-9 with 2 pins in the regular season. In the final weekend
of the season, Freed beat Oregon's Royce Repenn 4-2 and then
was pinned in 3:10 by Boise State's Scott Surplus. In his season
debut at 177, Freed placed fourth at the ASICS Oregon
Wrestling Classic, going 3-2. Freed had regained OSU's spot at
190 pounds on the trip to Lehigh. He was 5-5 at 190 and placed
fifth at the Dec. 7 Sheridan Tournament, going 4-1 with
1 major decision. Freed was a four-year letterwinner at Dallas
High and a state champion. Follow OSU wrestling at
http://osu.orst.edu/dept/wrestling |