Locked On Nittany Lions - Daily Podcast On Penn State Nittany Lions Football & Wrestling
LIVE: Penn State Wrestling Makes HISTORY, Josh Barr Returns, & Freshmen Star at Journeymen Duals (Part 2)
21 Dec 2025
Chapter 1: How did Penn State Wrestling make history against North Dakota State and Stanford?
It's the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. And then P.J. Duke. Oh, my, P.J. Duke. And I know I'm skipping over Marcus Blaze, but P.J. Duke, that was, what, potentially a semifinals matchup?
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Maybe I shouldn't go as far to say a championship matchup there, but possibly, possibly right.
Chapter 2: What potential do freshmen P.J. Duke and Marcus Blaze bring to the Nittany Lions?
P.J. Duke and Daniel Cardenas, the way that those two scrapped from start to finish, and P.J. Duke, His defense, his strength as a true freshman, it's unmatched. It's unprecedented, however you want to describe it. I've seen people floating the idea on social media.
I don't know how serious they are when they say this, but they're starting to make the comparisons to Kale Sanderson that he might never lose a college wrestling match. That's where the, hey, I didn't say that. Other people online are starting to say this, like, yeah, we have to acknowledge how good P.J. Duke is.
Chapter 3: What were Levi Haynes' significant performances during the duals?
Now, he's just a true freshman. This is one of his first serious iconic matchups here, and he gets the decisive victory. Decisive, you know, this one went down to the wire, but Duke needed a takedown. He got a takedown when he needed one. It's just the defense because Cardenas was relentless.
There were probably three separate occasions in the second and third periods where I said, okay, Duke's going to give up the takedown and you're going to, you might get in a situation where you lose that riding point and Cardenas wins this six to five, right? No, never in doubt because of Duke's defense and the strength that he had to fend off all of those shots and all of those scrambles.
So Duke's got to be, at some point, the favorite here at 157. It's a loaded 157-pound weight class. There are a lot of names in this class.
Chapter 4: How did Shane Van Ness secure a marquee win against Aiden Valencia?
Cardenas is one of them. Ty Waters is back this season for West Virginia. Landon Robidoux is emerging for Oklahoma State. He's one of those rising superstar freshmen, right, since they're going through the youth movement at OKSU. Vinny Zerbin for Iowa State. Brandon Cannon is only going to get better and stuff. You have Cardenas. You have Antrell Taylor, who's the defending champion, right?
Cannon Webster bumps up a weight class for Illinois. So PJ Duke, there's a long list of names in this weight class that we're going to be eager to see him wrestle any of them, especially some of those names in the Big Ten, Brandon Cannon in particular, when we get to Penn State, Ohio State.
Chapter 5: What challenges does Cole Mirasola face as a heavyweight?
Marcus Blaze. Marcus Blaze is also, again, strongly in the mix at 133. 133 is a loaded weight class, too, because Lucas Bird is the defending champion. I know I had Drake Ayala in 41 earlier, but Drake Ayala's in 133. Evan Frost, Ben Devino of Ohio State, that's the one that I can't wait for. But you go up against Tyler Knox, who was number six going into this matchup.
And not only do you, I mean, you win. Talk about winning decisively. You pin him. And Tyler Knox going with the Bush League move to avoid being pinned, to avoid being embarrassed by the true freshman.
Chapter 6: What are the implications of schedule uncertainty for Penn State's season?
Marcus Blaze calls it out to the ref and he says, the guy is pulling my singlet here. The ref does the right thing because they're in the middle of a scramble. They're in the middle of a move. that Marcus Blaze is trying to finish. And he just lets, he lets the match go, which is great. And then it transpires into the fall. So Marcus plays, everything is advertised here.
Same thing in that category, in that mix of this guy is a finals contender. He is just as strong as Ben Davino or Ayala or Evan Frost or bird. Any of them, all of those guys can contend for the finals this year.
Chapter 7: How do Penn State's chances against Ohio State look this season?
And Marcus plays is right there too. Similarly with, with PJ Duke. So, uh, At 157. And then we get to the overall, you know, there there were so many other there's so many other things that I can take away from this North Dakota State Stanford journeyman duels.
These matchups here that I didn't even get to write, you know, Levi Haynes having a solid performance against someone like a Lorenzo Norman, who's not a pushover by any means. You get a major decision there. You know, Shane Van Ness continues to put, you know, on a showcase, solid victory against a ranked Aiden Valencia, right?
There were, there should have been seven ranked opponents in the Stanford lineup. We didn't get to see all of them.
Chapter 8: What are the expectations for the Nittany Lions moving forward?
Luke Lillidal against Nico Provo. That's somebody who can easily be an All-American and maybe pull off some quiet upsets going into NCAAs. So you defeat Nico Provo of Stanford. And Cole Mirasola, to bounce back the way he did, I know, again, not the best competition he's going to face. But notice how easy it is. I just want to get this on the record because I couldn't help myself beforehand.
But Cole, his biggest weakness is just not being a physically developed heavyweight. It's not a talent issue. It is simply, he hasn't been wrestling as a true heavyweight for a long time. This is year two. And when you've wrestled two guys, two opponents that are comparable in size to you, it's just flat out domination. He goes and pins both of them.
I thought, I thought he pinned, but no, he tech fault. He tech fault the second opponent. Right within the final second of the first period. So that's why it was a buzzer beater. And I thought it was a pin, but no, he tech fault him. So he pins the first guy and then he tech falls the next guy. And it's just this, he has the speed. He has the agility.
He has everything he needs to close the gap with his technique. But when it comes to strength and size and leverage that other wrestlers have because they're taller, they're just more physically developed, that's really it. And that's just the thing that Cole Marisol is going to be facing all season long.
It's not going to jeopardize him his entire career at Penn State, but for this season, maybe a little bit next season as well. And Greg Kirkley dealt with the same thing, too, since he wasn't originally a heavyweight. He was a 197-pounder that bulked up to heavyweight. So Cole's doing the same thing. It's going to take him some time.
But notice, when he's facing comparable competition in terms of size, no chance. Absolutely no chance. So Cole... Um, this heavyweight class is fairly deep. So I do wonder it's going to be close if he's able to get onto the podium or not.
There are eight wrestlers right now that I look at that heavyweight class and say, you know, this younger Bastida, Isaac Trumbull, Nick Feldman, AJ Ferrari, Ben Keeter. If he's healthy, we saw him lose to Nathan Taylor, Connor Doucette, uh, Tay God, Yali, where we saw him lose to Christian Carroll. Those are nine names right now, right there that, uh,
Cole's going to be going up against for eight spots to be an All-American. It's going to be tough, but he's only going to get better. Again, wanted to point something out that Cole is still really talented, just facing an uphill battle since there's a major size disadvantage for him. And then the flow rankings. So I didn't get to that. I still want to talk to you guys in the live chat too.
They're going to be severely adjusted. And again, what flow is trying to do is they're trying to create neutral projections of sorts because Josh Barr is not in the lineup. So you can't rank him. You can presume that he's going to be the number one guy and flow even acknowledged. I think Christian piles on the broadcast for anybody that was watching the live stream.
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