It wasn’t as easy as the 10-4 score would indicate, but Nittany Lion Wrestling Club member Kyle Dake– who didn’t wrestle at Penn State but rather Cornell, where he was one of seven four-time national champs in history– won his second consecutive Bronze Medal.
He beat Serbia’s Khetag Tsabolov in dramatic fashion.
Dake went ahead 1-0 on a pushout within the first minute and kept that lead into the first intermission.
Dake added to that lead when Tsabolov was called for passivity and didn’t score within the 30-second window… or so we thought.
After review, it was determined that Tsabolob forced Dake out and thus tied it at one.
It then became 4-1 when Tsabolov got a point for a step out, then he got an extra point when Dake lost his challenge.
A takedown with 31 seconds left pulled Dake to within 4-3. Dake then scored seven points in a spectacular sequence to go ahead 10-4, which would be the final score.
At 33, there’s a real chance Dake has wrestled his last match. If so, he’ll have retired with four national titles in folkstyle, two Olympic Bronze Medals, four World Championships and five world medals. Surely, it’s one of the best careers in USA Wrestling history.
