The Junior 57 kg Bracket Is Bonkers This Weekend
The Junior 57 kg Bracket Is Bonkers This Weekend
The field in the 57 kg UWW Junior bracket makes it the toughest bracket in contention in Coralville.
One week after crowing the Cadet World Team, we get to watch the best wrestlers in the country aged 20 and under duke it out to make a World Team of their own.
Watch Junior & Senior Nationals LIVE on FloWrestling
Friday-Sunday, April 30-May 2, 2021
With this being a World Team trial, there will obviously be several great brackets, but 57 kg stands out above the rest for me. There are World Teamers, Fargo champion, and Super 32 champions galore. Let’s take a look at who to watch.
Top Contenders
Greg Diakomihalis
Cornell freshman Greg Diakomihalis, younger brother of Yianni, was the #15 recruit coming out of the class of 2020. He’s the top guy in the bracket who already has a year of training in a college room under his belt. It will be interesting to see how much a year of wrestling in a room like Cornell’s has helped Greg D. We haven’t seen since he won his fifth New York state title in early 2020, but he’s already beaten at least one top guy in this bracket: Cooper Flynn. However, he lost to Richie Figueroa in the 2019 Super 32 finals.
Watch Greg Diakomihalis and Richard Figueroa’s very close 2019 Super 32 final below.
Drake Ayala
Drake Ayala became the guy who beat the guy when he beat Richie Figs at Who’s #1 in October of 2020. Now, that match was folkstyle and went into overtime, so it will be fun to compare and contrast if they meet again in freestyle. That win made Ayala the #1 ranked high school wrestler at 120 lbs before he moved up to 126 where he’s the #1 ranked wrestler except for a couple of weeks while he was up at 132. The Hawkeye commit is also a 3X Iowa state champion, 2X Fargo champion, and Super 32 champion. Can he join Sebolt teammate Nate Jesuroga as an age-level World Teamer?
Watch Drake Ayala and Richard Figueroa’s Who’s #1 match below.
Richard Figueroa
Just because Richie Figs lost to Ayala at Who’s #1 doesn’t mean you should count him out. Like I said, that match was folkstyle and went into overtime. Prior to that match Figueroa was the #1 ranked wrestler in the class of 2021 and he’s still the #5 ranked wrestler in the country pound-for-pound. He’s the only one on this list who has made a freestyle World Team. In addition to that, the Arizona State commit is 3X California state champion.
Jett Strickenberger
While Jett Strickenberger hasn’t made a freestyle World Team, he did make the 2019 Cadet Greco World Team. Strickenberger is a guy who has increased his stock a lot over the past two years after failing to place at Super 32 2019. He notched a big win over Joey Cruz at Preseason Nationals this season. This reversed the result from their crazy 2019 UWW Cadet WTT match earlier in the year.
Watch Jett Strickenberger beat Joey Cruz at Preseason Nationals 2020 below.
Cooper Flynn
Ranked five spots ahead of Strickenberger at 120 is Cooper Flynn. Flynn has taken some losses in his career, including to both Greg Diakomihalis and Richard Figueroa (all though those were both multiple years ago), but when he’s on he’s on. More recently than both of those losses, the Virginia Tech commit has earned wins over Troy Spratley and Mason Gibson.
Watch Cooper Flynn beat Mason Gibson in the 2020 Super 32 finals below.
Top Challengers
Gabe Whisenhunt
Jore Volk
Joziah Fry
While to top 3-5 are going to be the heavy odds on favorites to win, look for all these guys to make deep runs and don’t count anything out.