Philadelphia– Mitchell Mesenbrink and Josh Barr will have a chance to bring individual wrestling championships to Penn State Saturday night and are excited that the President will be in attendance during that session.
Mesenbrink (165) will be competing in the title bout against Iowa’s Mikey Caliendo and Barr (197) will be going against another Hawkeye in Stephen Buchanan.
It’s not clear exactly how long Trump plans on staying but in any case, Mesenbrink and Barr feel his presence will be big for the sport.
WHAT MESENBRINK SAID
Mitchell Mesenbrink celebrates his victory over Iowa’s Mikey Caliendo.
Here’s what Mesenbrink had to say about Trump’s visit.
“If you put politics aside, no matter if you’re conservative or liberal or whatever, to have a president, the President of the United States be at something that we want to get people to watch, right? We want people to watch wrestling. We want people to be able to funnel not just money but I mean, people’s time and their attention is money. So I think that’s cool and I think if it was a conservative or liberal it’d be really, really cool, Democrat or Republican, whoever is the President of The United States, the leader of the free world at our wrestling event, that’s really cool when you think about it that way.”
WHAT BARR SAID
Photo by Penn State wrestling: Josh Barr
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For Barr, wrestling needs to become bigger, and having Trump involved injects life into the spot.
“It’s a great honor for the sport of wrestling,” he said. “I think the sport of wrestling is in a place where it needs growth and it needs that sort of life and energy and President Trump definitely brings that. So I think it’s a great thing for the sport and great to have our President’s kind of support as we try to compete to the best of our abilities tomorrow. So I think it’s just a really cool thing, a great opportunity and just grateful that he’s going to be here.”
Trump visited Penn State in October while he was still running for President and brought the wrestling team on stage with him. Mesenbrink was in Albania for the World Championships and Barr believes he was hanging out with his girlfriend.
Mesenbrink, Barr and Trump will all be in Philly Saturday, as will Carter Starocci, who is going for his fifth national title.
Trump was on hand when Starocci won his third title in Tulsa two years ago, and Starocci spoke highly of him after the bout.
“I like watching his interviews because he’s a big personality,” Starocci said in his presser following the 2023 Championships, which Trump attended in Tulsa. “He has a set of big balls. I like how his mind works. Pretty big being with him.”
Session V is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. with the sixth session following at 7.
