OSU senior Lance Palmer Big Ten Wrestler of the Week

Kevin Schlosser; www.buckeyewrestling.com

Ohio State senior Lance Palmer was named the Co-Big Ten Wrestler of the Week. He shares the award with Michigan State sophomore David Chezwa. Both wrestle at 149 pounds and each was undefeated last week against Big Ten opponents. This is the first time either wrestler has earned weekly conference honors.

“Lance Palmer represents everything that we want an Ohio State Buckeye to be,” said OSU head coach Tom Ryan. “His success comes as no surprise; he is a tireless worker and leads by example at practice and in the classroom.”

Palmer won his only match last week, a 5-3 decision against Frank Molinaro, to help the Buckeyes beat Penn State 21-14. In a match-up of returning All-Americans and top-five wrestlers, Palmer (#3) picked up a first period takedown for an early lead and used a third period reversal to put Molinaro (#5) away in the 149 pound match.

David Chezwa (#13) earned honors by downing a pair of ranked opponents over the weekend. He took a 12-8 decision over Minnesota’s Mario Mason (#18) and a 2-0 shutout from Illinois’s Eric Terrazas (#12).

Palmer and Chezwa will face each other in three weeks; Michigan State travels to Ohio State for a dual on February 14.

In his final season at OSU Lance Palmer is 18-1. He has won his last nine matches since suffering his only setback this season, a 3-1 loss to #2 Kyle Ruschell in the finals of the Las Vegas Invitational. Lance has scored bonus points in half of his matches with four pins and five major decisions. He has 4-1 record against top-ten opponents and is 6-1 against wrestlers in the top-twenty.

A three-time All-American Palmer joined Ohio State’s 100 win club with 12-4 major decision against Hofstra on January 3. Lance was the nineteenth Buckeye to rack up 100 career wins is 107-29 and sixteenth on the all-time list. With another All-American season both he and Mike Pucillo can join Tommy Rowlands as the only four-time All-American in OSU history.

The Buckeyes will return to action this weekend with a weekend road trip to the Hoosier state. Ohio State will wrestle Purdue on Friday night and Indiana on Sunday afternoon.

We caught up with Palmer after the Penn State dual on Sunday to get his thoughts on how his match against Molinaro went, an update of how his season is going, and what he is focused on the rest of the year.

Tom Ryan - Ryan on Palmer

Head coach Tom Ryan has coached Lance Palmer for the last four years at Ohio State. We met with Ryan today to discuss what the award means to Palmer, what Lance means to the team, and to find out why he has been so successful for the Buckeyes.