Brown and White

              lehigh university brown and white 215-866-0331 vy___-__c . a___assb9bbs3osiv special ncaa wrestling issue bethlehem pa monday march 22 1976 grapplers place fifth frick repeats it was harder the second time ' ' mike frick finals but it's no good if you don't win coming in second is no prize frick's win vaulted the engineers into fifth spot in the team standing ahead of cal poly who had taken a temporary lead over the grapplers when mark digiralamo won at 118 the squad finished with 55.25 points lowa ran away with the team title amassing 123.25 points while lowa state came in second with 85.75 points oklahoma state 64.5 and wisconsin 64 rounded out the top five three wrestlers besides frick ac cumulated placement points for the engineers although unable to defend his 177 pound title mike lieberman only lost once in the three day event and the by fred haynes the engineer wrestling team crowned one champion placed four wrestlers in the top six and finished fifth in the ncaa wrestling championships held march il ls senior co-captain mike frick ended his engineer career by defeating michigan state's two-time national champ pat milkovich 7-4 in the 134 pound final to win his second consecutive national title in the most exciting of the final ten bouts frick fell behind in the second period when milkovich escaped early and took frick down to gain a 3-0 lead frick managed to escape but entered the final period behind 3-1 the engineer senior used a quick escape and almost immediate takedown to jump ahead 4-2 but milkovich escaped to knot the score at 4-4 the two past champions remained cautious but with 1 : 10 remaining frick used a single leg takedown and riding time to gain his second national title and complete an undefeated season after winning the national crown frick commented i wasn't too excited about reaching the finals last night but now i am really happy it's one thing to get to the engineer co-captain took third defeating willie gadson of lowa state and sythell thompson of cal poly in the consolation rounds lieberman's only loss 8-4 came in the semi-finals when he was unable to convert any of his takedown efforts against mark johnson the tournaments number four seed from michigan perhaps the biggest surprise of the tournament for the engineers was bob sloand although an eastern champion sloand entered the tourney unseeded and drew the number two seed bob antonacci of lowa state in the first round sloand used a second period reversal and a three minute third period ride to defeat the cyclone 3-2 and went on to defeat dennis goldberg of indiana state 10-4 and mark ison of weber state 9-8 to reach the semi finals sloand lost to harold wiley from the university of california at santa barbara 7-6 but was able to wrestle back to fourth in doing so sloand registered the only engineer pin of the tourney showing joe goldsmith of southern illinois the lights at national champ mike frick prevents pat milkovich of michigan state from escaping in 134-pound final frick used two third period takedowns to erase an early 3-1 deficit and win his second consecutive ncaa crown the win moved the engineers into fifth place in overall standing sloand engineers comeback during the first half of the engineer wrestling season the grapplers found themselves continually forced to come from behind to win matches much of this may have been caused by the absence of mike frick but it can also be credited to the slow start of bob sloand sloand was 4-10 after the navy match and although several of his losses were by one or two points he was not wrestling like a future eastern champion sloand himself admits this stating the first half of the season had to be the lowest point of my career until after the western trip i wrestled worse than i have ever wrestled in my career after losing to mike beck at navy the engineer junior began a complete turn about that saw him win his last six dual meets of the season including four pins to end his dual meet record at 10-10 sloand continued his winning ways at lancaster pinning three of his four opponents in capturing the first of five engineer eastern crowns however despite this fast finish sloand entered the national tournament unseeded in a weight class that contained many good strong contenders in his first match at tucson sloand wrestled big eight champion and number two seed bob antonacci of lowa state after a scoreless first period sloand escaped only to be taken down by the cyclone 126 pounder with less than ten seconds remaining in the period sloand engineered what proved to be the winning reversal entering the third period ahead 3-2 sloand used his legs to ride the shorter antonacci for the entire period to clinch the upset win the engineer junior coasted by dennis goldberg 10-4 before giving engineer fans another exciting one point win in the quarterfinals sloand used an arm bar to turn mark ison of weber state for three points in the second period and then pulled a classic switch maneuver to open the third period to gain a 9-8 win in the quarterfinals harold wiley of ucsb turned the tables on sloand in the semifinal round winning a one point 7-6 decision a late escape by wiley in the second period gave him a 7-6 lead entering the final period since sloand was unable to gain the riding time point he was forced to either attempt to turn wiley over or let him up and take him down sloand chose to work for the back points claiming the strongest part of my wrestling is turning people over i guess i just did not go hard enough for the back points against wiley i never really thought about letting him up the loss put sloand in the wrestlebacks where he did succeed in turning joe goldsmith of southern t llinois over registering a fall at 4:55 ken nelson of oklahoma defeated sloand 8-2 in the third place consolation final haynes unwilling opponent bob sloand attempts to turn ken nelson of oklahoma to his back in consolation finals although the engineer junior failed losing 8-2 he did succeed in placing fourth in the tournament knocking off the number two seed bob antonacci of lowa state in the first round see frick pg 4