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The Harvard Crimson wrestling team will host the No. 16 Princeton Tigers on Friday as both teams enter Ivy League action.
The match (6 p.m. ET start time) won’t be on TV, but anyone in the U.S can watch it live on ESPN+:
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Once signed up for ESPN+, you can then watch Princeton vs Harvard live on your computer via ESPN.com, or on your phone (Android and iPhone compatible), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or other streaming device via the ESPN app.
Princeton vs Harvard Preview
Princeton’s dropped consecutive dual matches on the road to slip to 2-4 on the season, falling to the No. 8 UNC Tar Heels on Jan. 10 before succumbing to the No. 4 North Carolina State Wolfpack a day later.
Three Tigers wrestled to top-five finishes at least year’s national championships: Patrick Glory (fifth at 125 pounds), Matthew Kolodzik (fifth at 149 pounds), and Patrick Brucki (fourth at 197 pounds).
Brucki is 12-2 this year, ranked No. 3 at 197 by InterMat. Before last year’s national championships, Princeton head coach Chris Ayres praised the then-sophomore’s leadership.
“He’s the best leader I’ve ever had at Lehigh or here, it’s like having a coach that hangs out with the team,” Ayres said, according to NJ.com. “At the end of last year, we knew we weren’t going to have a captain coming out this year. But watching Pat freshman year I knew he was born to be a leader. This kid is the best. In exit interviews, I quietly asked them who is the best leader and 95 percent said Pat Brucki. That’s the level of respect he has in the room. He puts as much effort into one workout as most people put into two.”
Kolodzik is taking a redshirt year as he prepares for April’s Olympic trials. Last year, he and Brucki became Princeton’s first-ever Midlands champions.
Glory, who’s 15-0 and ranked No. 3 at 125 by InterMat, claimed the program’s third Midlands title in December, as Brucki placed third.
The Iowa Hawkeyes’ Spencer Lee, ranked No. 1 at 125, pulled out of the tournament with a medical forfeit. Jack Mueller of the Virginia Cavaliers, ranked No. 2 in the weight class, didn’t enter.
“I 100 percent wish I’d been able to face those guys,” Glory said, according to The Daily Princetonian. “Being a champion feels great, obviously, but I want to get my hands on the guys I’ll be facing in the postseason.”
The Crimson lost dual matches to the No. 17 Cornell Big Red and the Binghamton Bearcats on Saturday, falling to 1-6 on the season.
They’re led in victories by a pair of freshman: 165-pound No. 17 Phil Conigliaro (21-6) and heavyweight No. 10 Yaraslau Slavikouski (21-7). The duo opened the season by finishing first and second, respectively, at the Bearcat Open in November. Conigliaro claimed another title at the Keystone Classic later that month.
“This was an important step towards our goal of placing guys high at the EIWA tournament,” Harvard captain Hunter Ladnier, a 157-pounder, said after he placed fourth at the Bearcat Open, according to The Harvard Crimson. “Sending guys to nationals, and producing national champions.”