NCAA Wrestling: Bryce Hepner rebounds to earn All-American status

CLEVELAND — Bryce Hepner had to overcome a lot of obstacles in his college wrestling career, and the resilience paid off Friday night when he became an All-American. A third-period escape was all it took for Hepner, a University of North Carolina graduate student, to win his 165-pound blood round match against Northern Iowa's Ryder Downey and guarantee himself a spot on the podium at the NCAA Division I Wresting Championships at Rocket Arena. "Being an All-American is something that is pretty indescribable. This is something I've been looking forward to for a very long time," said Hepner, who's from Avon. "I never went to an NCAA before I transferred to UNC. Those guys took a chance on me. They never stopped believing in me and somehow I found a way to start believing in myself again." Hepner won two matches Thursday to advance from the Round of 32 to the quarterfinals. A quarterfinal loss to Penn State's Mitchell Mesenbrink sent Hepner into the consolation bracket. "After I lost to Mesenbrink I really didn't care how the tournament was going," Hepner said. "Then I got it in my mind this is the blood round. I could wrestle a great tournament, which I have, but if I didn't win this match it really wouldn't mean anything." After the match Hepner was able to celebrate with his former St. Edward High School teammate Paddy Gallagher, who defeated Stanford's E.J. Parco 5-2 in sudden victory to earn his All-American status. "I'm not grateful that I am an All-American, I am grateful for the people in my life who have put me in position to do these things," Hepner said. He lost to Arizona State's Nicco Ruiz 2-0 in the fifth round of consolations and will wrestle for seventh place Saturday morning. Ohio State will have a pair of wrestlers battling for a national title Saturday night as Ben Devino (133) and Jesse Mendez (141) won their semifinals in dramatic fashion. Mendez, a two-time defending national champion, defeated Lehigh's Luke Stanich 4-1 in sudden victory. He will face Oklahoma State's Sergio Vega in the final. "This is the most exciting tournament in the world," Mendez said. "I didn't score as much as I wanted to in my match. When we went into overtime I knew I had to get one and got some under hook and I just kinda went from there. "The only thing I was thinking about was to get a score. You can't overcomplicate it, you can't think about what's going wrong in the match, or what's going right, you just have to get the next score." Devino had to withstand a two-minute sudden victory period and two lengthy replay challenges to defeat Penn State's Marcus Blaze 3-2 in a tiebreaker. Stalling was called on Devino for the second time in the match with one second remaining in the tiebreaker to tie the match at 2, but Davino had an eight-second riding time advantage in the tiebreaker that got him the extra point he needed to move on and wrestle for a national championship in his first NCAA Tournament. "That one was electric, there were a lot of ups and downs in the match, but at the end of the day winners win," Devino said. "I found a way to win." Devino also defeated Blaze two weeks ago in the tiebreaker in the third-place match at the Big Ten Tournament. Devino will also face an Oklahoma State wrestler, Jax Forrest, in the 133 final. Ohio State's Carson Kharchla (174) and Brandon Cannon (157) earned All-American status will blood round wins. Contact Todd Shapiro at (440) 329-7135 or ctsports@chroniclet.com.