NCAA Bracket / Live Results

ST. LOUIS, Mo. - East Stroudsburg University junior Chris Birchler nearly upset the No. 1-ranked heavyweight in Division I before winning his first consolation match over a familiar opponent at the NCAA Wrestling Championships on Thursday at the Scottrade Center in St. Louis.

Birchler took top-ranked David Zabriskie of Iowa State into overtime before dropping a 6-4 decision in the afternoon session. He defeated Zach Hammond of Cornell 4-1 later in the evening, a repeat of his 3-1 decision over Hammond at the EIWA Championships two weeks ago on the way to claiming his trip to the NCAA Championships.

Against Zabriskie (31-2), Birchler took a 4-3 lead with 41 seconds left in the third period, then kept him down just long enough to get Zabriskie's riding time under a minute before giving up the escape. He nearly had a takedown at the edge of the mat at the end of regulation before going into overtime, where Zabriskie got in on Birchler's leg and scored a takedown off the ensuing scramble for the 6-4 decision.

In the first period, Zabriskie had a takedown and Birchler escaped to trail 2-1 going into the second. ESU's junior chose down and got out to tie the score at 2-2 while Zabriskie compiled a riding time advantage of over a minute. Zabriskie was down to open the third period and escaped to go ahead 3-2 before Birchler scored his takedown to go ahead for the first time in the match. Zabriskie held a 59-second edge in riding time at the final whistle.

Birchler won the 50th match in his first two years at ESU in the evening session and advances to take on No. 6 Mitchell Monteiro of Cal State-Bakersfield. Monteiro took a 2-1 decision over Edinboro's Joe Fendone in his first match, then fell 4-2 in overtime to Lehigh's Zach Rey.

In his bout with Hammond, Birchler picked up the first point of the match with an escape to open the second period after a scoreless first three minutes. Hammond leveled the count at 1-1 by escaping in the third period before Birchler recorded the only takedown of the match.

Hammond made it to his feet but Birchler slammed him back on the mat and kept him down to finish the match. The additional point for a minute advantage of riding time gave Birchler a 4-1 decision. Hammond took a 3-1 decision over EIWA foe Trey McLean of Penn before facing Birchler.

Birchler has won 25 matches during both the 2007-08 and 2008-09 seasons. He was 25-10 as a sophomore and will take a 25-6 record into his match-up with Monteiro on Friday morning.