TOM's What to Watch For at the 2021 World Championships

Tamyra Mensah-Stock and Blessing Oborududu in the 68kg golid-medal match at the Tokyo Olympic Games. Photo courtesy of United World Wrestling. 

It’s hard to believe we are less than a day away from the 2021 Senior World Championships in Oslo, Norway, October 2-10, but here we are!

If you’re a fan of USA Wrestling and Team USA, there is plenty of reason for optimism as eight of the nine freestyle Olympic medalists from the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games will be returning to the mats inside Jordal Amfi in Oslo.

https://twitter.com/USAWrestling/status/1443980239692972035

The event starts with a men’s freestyle competition October 2-5, women’s freestyle action October 4-7, and Greco-Roman wrestling October 7-10.

https://twitter.com/theopenmat/status/1443205446974722055

Here are some things to keep in mind ahead of  the 2021 Senior World Championships (in no particular order) as the tree tournaments get underway over the next 10 days. 

+  Our Freestyle Teams are Loaded:

 In freestyle, Team USA is poised to contend for a team medal in both the men’s and women’s tournaments. After all, the Red, White, and Blue are coming off of historically great Olympic performances earlier this year in August. Team USA had 11 total freestyle competitors bring home nine medals, including four gold medals, a pair of silver medals, and three bronze medals to cap it off. Eight of those nine medalists accepted the automatic bid to the World Team. While these eight superstars aren’t guaranteed repeat performances at the 2021 World Championships, you have to like their chances on paper. But as we know, wrestling matches aren’t decided on paper. 

+ Many Olympic Medalists are Skipping the 2021 World Championships:

 Another reason you have to like Team USA’s chances in Oslo is because we were one of the few countries to have nearly 100% participation from our 2020 Olympians in freestyle completion. As of September 22, FloWrestling’s Jon Kozak reported that, at that time, 40 of 96 men’s Olympians and 33 of the 96 Olympians on the women’s side were competing in Oslo. In total that’s roughly 38% of the 2020 Olympians will be at the World Championships. 

https://twitter.com/KozakJon/status/1440790812044902405

+  Multiple Olympic Finals Rematches are Expected: 

Even though many Olympians have opted out, three Tokyo 2020 gold-medal matchups could (and likely will) happen again at Worlds 2021.

 With that, on the women’s side, Tamyra Mensah-Stock (68kg) should meet Nigeria’s Blessing Oborududu. On the men’s side, it is practically a foregone conclusion that David Taylor (86kg) and Kyle Synder (97kg) are destined to be on a collision course with Iran’s Hassan Yazdani at 86kg and Russia’s Abdulrashid Sadulaev at 97kg. All three pairing pairings have quite a bit of history behind them. Mensah-Stock is a perfect 4-0 against the Nigerian who became her country’s first Olympic medalist in Tokyo. Although the American is undefeated in this matchup, the bouts are always close. Taylor is a perfect 3-0 against his Iranian foe, but their matchup in Tokyo was electric and wasn’t decided until the final 20 seconds of the match. Were it not for the heroics of Gable Steveson in his gold-medal bout, Taylor – Yazdani III would have been the best match in Tokyo. Concerning the Snyder vs. Sadulaev, the series is 2-1 in favor of the “Russian Tank,” with Sadulaev winning the last two. 

For Oborududu, Yazdani, and Snyder, favorable outcomes in these potential gold-medal rematches feel critical for the psychological aspect of these rivalries in the years to come. 

+ Legendary Status at Stake for Jordan Burroughs and Adaline Gray

We often refer to some elite athletes within a chosen sport as the Greatest of All Time. We call them “The GOAT.” At the 2021 World Championships, that terminology might get thrown around once again depending on how freestylers Jordan Burroughs (79kg) and Adeline Gray (76kg) perform. 

Heading into Oslo, Burroughs is an eight-time World/Olympic medalist. What makes this opportunity unique is that the 33-year-old Burroughs will be wrestling up at 79kg for the first time in his career at an international event. 

He was fantastic at the 2021 U.S. World Team Trials (the only other time Jordan wrestled at 79kg). His signature double-leg had a pop and power we haven’t seen in quite some time. Also, advantageous, many of his competitors in Norway haven’t faced him before. The only concern for J.B. is a potential leg injury that he may have suffered in the Team Trials Best-of-Three Championship Series against Alex Dieringer. 

For Gray, the 2020 Olympic Games runner-up is already one of the most decorated female wrestlers in Team USA history. After earning a silver medal in Tokyo this summer, Gray, like Burroughs, is also an eight-time World/Olympic medalist. She has five gold medals from the World Championships to her credit already and will be in pursuit of her sixth in Norway. 

Whether she wins a medal in Oslo, Gray's place in the laurels of USA Wrestling glory is already cemented. Regrettably, though, Gray will not get the opportunity to avenge her Olympic finals defeat to Germany’s Aline Rotter-Focken, as Rotter-Focken retired after The Games in Tokyo. 

+  Can Yianni End Team USA’s Medal Drought at 65kg? 

Over the last decade and a half, the performances of Team USA’s men’s and women’s freestylers on the World and Olympic stage have gradually gotten more successful. 

With that success in mind, the one problem area for the Red, White, and Blue has been in the 65kg weight class, typically one of the deepest in the world. Since its addition to the World Championship weight classes in 2014, this remains the only weight where an American has failed to earn a medal. 

Should Cornell two-time NCAA champ Yianni Diakomihalis snag a medal as part of his first World Team, he will become the first American to earn a medal at 65kg since current men’s freestyle head coach Bill Zadick, who did so in 2007 (at 66kg). Also, this was the only freestyle weight on either side that the U.S. failed to qualify at the Tokyo Olympic Games.

Will Yianni end the 65kg slump for Team USA? Let’s hope so! If he wrestles like he did in Lincoln last month, he has a chance. According to Kozak, none of the top-8 from this weight from Tokyo are competing in Oslo.

 I like Yianni’s chances to break the medal drought for the Americans. 

+ Will Kylie Welker Become a World Champion as a High Schooler?

Whenever the USA succeeds in wrestling on an international stage, it’s fun to watch and cheer them on. But, what has made the rather meteoric rise of the Team USA women’s freestylers so compelling has been the youth movement we have seen. 

As you may recall, Kennedy Blades (68kg) and Kylie Welker (76kg) were the talks of the U.S. Olympic Team Trials earlier this year after making runs to the Best-of-Three Finals at Trials as 17-year-old high school juniors. 

Since then, both have gone on to win Junior World Championships at 68kg (Blades) and 76kg (Welker) respectively in Ufa, Russia, both in a very dominant fashion. 

In Oslo, Kylie will try to double-up and win herself a Senior World gold medal before going for the World gold medal hattrick with a U23 World gold medal in November in Belgrade, Serbia. 

Team USA’s Greco-Roman Squad Welcomes Some Fresh Faces to the 2021 Senior World Team: 

After each of the four Greco competitors failed to earn a medal in Tokyo, all 10 weights were contested earlier this month at the U.S. World Team Trials in Lincoln. Olympian G’Angelo Handcock is the only athlete from Tokyo to compete at the World Championship in Norway next week. 

In Nebraska, there were some surprises. Chiefly, three of the four 2020 Tokyo Olympians won’t be at Worlds with the World Team. 

Another surprise is that college standouts Peyton Omania of Michigan State (67kg) and Cohlton Schultz of Arizona State (130kg) made their first Senior-level World Team. With that, Omania and Schultz are two of Team USA’s five first-time World Teamers. 

Also exciting, two-time Olympian Ben Provisor of NAIA Grand View University and the New York Athletic Club qualified for his second Senior World Team this year in 2021. 

Hopefully, someone on this 2021 Greco World Team, which is  comprised of a pair of former Olympians and five USA World Team newcomers can find a spark, ending the string of lackluster Greco performances for the USA on the biggest of Senior-level stages lately. 

I like Cohlton Schultz’s chances to bring home a medal later next week in Norway. 



Back to articles