Moisey Prepped for NWCA All-Star Classic
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (October 31, 2015) – No. 4 Zeke Moisey of the No. 21/23 West Virginia University wrestling team is set for a rematch with No. 1 Nathan Tomasello of Ohio State at the 50th Annual Hire Heroes NWCA All-Star Classic, presented by the Wrestlers in Business Network on November 1 in Atlanta, Georgia. The event is slated for a 5 p.m. start at McCamish Pavilion on the campus of Georgia Tech and will be broadcast live on ESPNU.
“It is a great honor for both our program and Zeke as an individual to be selected for this tournament,” said coach Sammie Henson, who wrestled in the 1994 NWCA All-Star Classic while competing for Clemson. “This is a great opportunity and an awesome way to get the season off to an exciting start.”
It marks the fourth all-time meeting between Moisey and Tomasello, who last met in the 2015 NCAA Championship Finals in March. Moisey, who shed his redshirt three weeks into the season, upset four seeded opponents, pinning No. 6 Thomas Gilman of Iowa in the semifinals to advance to the finals where he would face No. 4 seed Tomasello. Moisey dropped a 9-5 decision to Tomasello to take the runner-up spot.
The two first met in the opening weekend of the 2014-15 season at the Michigan State Open, with then-No. 11 Tomasello winning a 19-6 major decision over Moisey, who competed unattached as a redshirt at the event. Moisey and Tomasello squared off again at the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational in December, as then-No. 9 Tomasello won a 15-10 decision. It marked the lone loss for Moisey, who went on to take eighth place at the tournament.
Moisey went 32-14 on the season, taking the runner-up spot at the Big 12 Championship in Ames, Iowa in early March. He then earned an at-large bid to the NCAA championships, where he finished as the runner-up at 125 pounds. Moisey became the first unseeded wrestler to compete in the NCAA finals since 2003 and the first WVU wrestler to do so since Greg Jones won a national title in 2005.
The Northampton, Pennsylvania, native is the 30th All-American in WVU wrestling history, and was the first Mountaineer to earn the honor since Brandon Rader in 2007.
The Mountaineers open the 2015-16 season on Sunday, Nov. 8 at the WVU Coliseum as they host Drexel, Campbell and Arizona State as part of the Mountaineer Quad.
Moisey Drops Match at All-Star Classic
ATLANTA, Ga. (November 1, 2015) – No. 4 Zeke Moisey dropped a 7-1 decision to defending NCAA National Champion and No. 1 ranked Nathan Tomasello of Ohio State in the 125-pound match at the NWCA All-Star Classic at McCamish Pavilion on the campus of Georgia Tech in Atlanta on Sunday evening.
“We’re not pleased with the outcome, but we’re glad we got the opportunity to come to the NWCA All-Star Classic and find where we are at right now,” said WVU head coach Sammie Henson. “This is a good gauge to start the season.”
Using experimental rules at the event, takedowns were worth three points rather than the traditional two (it would have been a 5-1 decision using NCAA scoring).
Though Moisey was warned early for stalling, neither wrestler got on the board until Tomasello scored a takedown 1:45 into the first period for a 3-0 lead. He carried the lead, along with 1:15 of riding time, into the second period.
Moisey won choice and chose the defensive position to start the second. Tomasello controlled the match before giving Moisey an escape on a restart as he got on the board trailing 3-1 with 30 seconds to go. Tomasello then registered a last second takedown to close the period with a 6-1 advantage. Neither scored in the third, though Moisey came close. Tomasello tacked on a point for riding time to earn the 7-1 decision.
The match marked the fourth all-time meeting between the two, with Tomasello holding a 4-0 lead. Prior to the All-Star Classic, the most recent meeting was the 2015 NCAA Finals where Tomasello won a 9-5 decision.
Shedding his redshirt in mid-November, Moisey became the Cinderella story of the tournament as he upset four seeded opponents, pinning No. 6 Thomas Gilman of Iowa in the semifinals to advance to the finals where he would face No. 4 seed Tomasello. He was the first unseeded wrestler to qualify for the finals since 2003.
Moisey, who was also the 2015 Big 12 runner-up, finished the season with a 32-14 mark and became WVU’s first All-American since 2007.
No. 21/23 West Virginia opens the 2015-16 season on Sunday, Nov. 8, at the WVU Coliseum as they host Drexel, Campbell and Arizona State as part of the Mountaineer Quad.
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