By Pete Ruden | [email protected]
Brandon Sorensen has had a tough 13 days. Over the past two weeks, the junior from Cedar Falls has taken on current No. 2 Anthony Collica of Oklahoma State, No. 1 Zain Retherford of Penn State, and Ohio State’s No. 5 Micah Jordan.
After losing matches in two tiebreaker periods to Collica and Retherford, Sorensen got back on the right track with a 2-0 win over Jordan on Jan. 27 in Carver-Hawkeye.
In a match with just one escape that some might call boring, Sorensen sees room for improvement.
“It’s nice to be on the other side, but here’s the thing: you’re getting talked to the same way. That’s not a match I want to wrestle right there,” he said. “Win or lose that, you’re getting talked to the same way, and that’s not how we want it done.”
Still, as one of the marquee matchups of the night, the victory helped give Iowa a much-needed win over No. 4 Ohio State.
Sorensen earned a point for an escape after starting down in the second period, then rode Jordan for the entire third period to pick up another point for riding time.
The win was Sorensen’s most impressive of the season. Before the loss, Jordan was undefeated (21-0), and he had wins over No. 6 Justin Oliver of Central Michigan and No. 10 Pat Lugo of Edinboro.
“[Jordan’s] sticky, but it doesn’t matter. He’s rangy and long, it doesn’t matter,” head coach Tom Brands said. “There are a lot of ways to win that match, and one of them is to win 2-0, get an escape and get riding time, and he put a ride on him. That’s one gutsy way to win, but we could score more points.”
After Sorensen’s tough matches with Collica, Retherford, and Jordan, Ohio State head coach Tom Ryan took notice.
Sorensen scored 9 points in that match at Carver-Hawkeye Arena one week ago, but Ryan didn’t think that would be his strategy this time around.
Ryan, who went to Iowa, said that because Jordan is good on his feet, he figured Iowa’s strategy would be to ride him.
“We watched Sorensen last week wrestle really tough against Retherford,” Ryan said. “He’s done a really good job working on bottom. We gotta work harder on bottom. So it’s on our athlete, and it’s on us.”
The runner-up at nationals last year, Sorensen is still proving that he can compete with those at the top of the rankings.
And just as Sorensen lost two matches against top-two opponents two duals in a row, so did the Hawkeyes as a team. But after a big bounce back against more top-five opponents, both have found ways to improve and come out of the dual as victors.
“Big takeaways is pace is huge. You can compare that to the last few matches I wrestled here,” Sorensen said. “Getting two hands to that leg, double pumping, double attacks, and getting to him. That’s the thing that sticks out to me right now that needs to be done. And putting on a tough ride.”