Penn State wrestling star Luke Lilledahl didn’t lose much as a true freshman last season: in fact, it only happened three times.
One of the three losses happened in Piscataway, New Jersey, against Rutgers’ Dean Peterson.
In a low-scoring affair, the older Peterson won, 4-1, and afterward, took a shot at both Lilledahl and Penn State in a tweet that was removed fairly quickly after.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.Fast forward almost a full year, and Lilledahl– who ended his true freshman season with a Big Ten Championship and third-place finish at the NCAA’s— made his Carver Hawkeye Arena debut against Iowa. His opponent, now in a new singlet, was Peterson, who transferred to Iowa over the winner.
Peterson’s singlet wasn’t the only thing different about this rematch: The result was quite different, too.
Instead of dropping a low-scoring decision, Lilledahl, ranked second at 125, won a high-scoring bout, 11-5, nearly majoring No. 6 Peterson.
Coming into the bout, Lilledahl wasn’t thinking about revenge against Peterson, but rather, just his personal growth.
“I’m just looking forward to the environment there,” Lilledahl told reporters Wednesday. “Obviously, wrestling a guy that beat me previously, it’s pretty fun to wrestle him again, and I don’t want to say to get him back, but that’s kind of the way some people would look at it,” Lilledahl said. “I just look at it as another chance to show how much I have improved since the last time I wrestled him.”
Lilledahl is now 10-1 overall on the season and 8-0 In dual meets, with his only loss in any competition being to his own teammate, Nathan Desmond, at the Army Black Knight Invitational in November.
