There is a special sort of pride that comes with being a part of the wrestling community. We do not get much respect. Our large events that should be on national television are mostly available live only on the internet, when sports such as curling and bull riding take precedent on ESPN.

We, as a community, wait for those special moments, the monumental match ups, which can draw the attention of not just the entire wrestling community, but the attention of those who are unfamiliar with our sport. Nick Suriano’s showdown with Daton Fix was that opportunity.

The match was simply a debacle. You can point the finger at a number of contributing factors. But no matter who or what you blame, the most hyped up match in the last several years was bad for the sport of wrestling.

HERE IS WHY:

The length of reviews: In my opinion, challenges ARE good for the sport. I would much rather see a call made correctly, than have the wrong call poorly impact the outcome of a match. However, the review process should not take longer than two minutes.

In the match between Suriano and Fix, three reviews were made during the bout. One by each coach, and an official review. These three reviews all took longer than five minutes each. It should not be that long, or that difficult, to decide the correct call, time of the match, and starting position.

Rather than quick and efficient reviews, lengthy reviews completely sucked the momentum out of the match. Both wrestlers were busy pacing back and forth, while fans grew restless when awaiting a decision.

If this were to happen once, it most likely would not have been such a big deal. But to have three extremely lengthy replay reviews takes the excitement and drama out of the match. Officials, and the NCAA, need to figure out a way to make the review process much timelier.

THE OFFICIATING:

Now I want to start off by saying, no wrong calls were made during this match, but that does not mean that the officiating was good.

Human error is obviously a part of sports, and life. We are all guilty of making mistakes. These referees, however, simply looked lost during the match.

Maybe it was the hype that surrounded the match, and made the moment too big for the officials. It could be the long replays that made the referees unaware of the situations in the match. Regardless of what it was, these two did not seem sure of themselves during the entire bout

Let’s start from regulation. The referee could have influenced more action in the match. There were plenty of moments where either Suriano, Fix, or both could have been hit with stalling warnings. Those warnings could have made the wrestlers take more aggressive approaches at scores.

Instead, we saw over eight minutes of hand-fighting, thumb blocks, half-hearted shot attempts, and fakes. I do not feel that the coaches or fans of either side would have had a problem with a stall call on either wrestler to dictate a more eager attempt at a score.

Secondly, after reviews, the officials were unaware of starting positions. That is something that cannot be so easily forgotten in such an important match. This was most prevalent after the hands to the face call in the second sudden victory overtime.

When the official awarded the penalty point to Daton Fix, the match was over. Rather than bringing the wrestlers to the center to shake hands, the referee set Suriano and Fix in neutral to continue the action, evening blowing the whistle to start the clock.

It was not until the Oklahoma State bench approached the table, after the whistle to resume action blew, when the officials realized the bout was over. That indicates one of two things to me: the referees were unaware of the call they made, and the implications that came with it; or the officials had an absolute lapse of concentration, being lost in such a big match.

Which leads me to the ever-so controversial hands to the face call.

Did Suriano palm Fix’s head? It looked like it. Was it the right call? Yes. Did it need to be called? Absolutely not.

Now you’re on one of the two sides of the fence here, being: rules are rules, or that the call did not need to be made.

I feel the call did not need to be made for several reasons. The first being that there was a number of times where the hands to the face call could have been made throughout the entirety of the match on both wrestlers.

It happened frequently enough, where a mic’d up Coach Goodale was heard by Flowrestling telling Coach Pritzlaff to get Suriano to keep his hands out of Fix’s face.

The blow that was the match ending call was not a malicious or impacting blow either. Fix was not poked in the eye, and the post to the head was not overly aggressive. Does that mean it was the wrong call? It does not. But it can certainly be argued that it did not need to be called.

THE WRESTLERS:

Scoring is a hot-topic in the sport of wrestling. The lack of it is one of the reasons the Olympic committee wanted to get rid of wrestling from the Olympic games. In-turn, the attempt to boot wrestling changed the way wrestling is scored internationally. Point being: scoring and action make things, even to the uneducated spectator, more exciting.

I had several people say to me “I do not know much about the sport of wrestling, but that did not seem like a good match”. Those people were not wrong.

Nick Suriano and Daton Fix are two of the most explosive wrestlers in the NCAA. The two are known for a fast pace, and an alpha-like approach to dominate their opponents. For some reason, when they face off, neither seems to force the action.

In three bouts (Flo’s Who’s #1, Akron freestyle nationals, and this bout) the two have had a cumulative match duration of approximately 67 minutes. In that hour and seven minutes, only one take down has been score.

For two wrestlers that secure such a high number of bonus point victories, the stat is quite mind blowing. The question is: why does this seem to happen?

For one, the hand fighting was not used to set up offense, but rather to prevent it. Both wrestlers stayed primarily in a thumb-block position. Meaning, in an over-tie, where the hand and thumb are jammed into the neck/shoulder area of the opponent.

The hands are the first line of defense in wrestling. In a thumb-block, the hands change levels as the opponent change levels, and prevent the opposition from penetrating forward into a leg attack.

As I said before, the official could have made an effort to entice more of an offensive effort from both wrestlers, but the wrestlers need to make action happen as well.

Both Coach Goodale and Coach Smith displayed disappointment in the offensive efforts from their wrestlers. Suriano and Fix owned up to the lack of scores in their post-match interviews as well. Next time Suriano and Fix square off will we see these two let it fly like the wrestling world knows they’re capable of? I sure hope so.