Harvard All-American and Long-Time Wrestling Coach John H. Lee Passes Away

John H. Lee, a two-time All-American and head wrestling coach at Harvard for 18 seasons, passed away February 10, 2009 after a long illness...

Please visit this LINK and share a story, a memory or just read the stories that people leave. Let us all remember the legacy of John H. Lee.

Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational

We have just returned from a great weekend of Wrestling at the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational. We took 8 wrestlers to compete and we are beginning to make strides. We are a unit, a team and although we placed 3 wrestlers and had one in the round of 12, we are not satisfied, we need to compete as a whole. Corey Jantzen has made leaps and bounds and is beginning to make some damage at the 141lb weight class. He beat returning national champion J Jaggers of Ohio State in quarter finals and then pinned Chris Drouin of Arizona State who is ranked 4th in the country. JP O'Connor had a great tournament of his own with his only loss of the tournament coming to Jordan Burroughs of Nebraska who is ranked two spots ahead of him at number 3 in the country. JP came back to take 3rd in the tournament. Louis Caputo's only loss of the season and of the tournament came in the finals to 5th ranked Kirk Smith of Boise State in a close 3-1 Decision. Freshmen Walter Peppelmen had a first round loss to 14th ranked Cesar Grajales of Penn and came back tough in the wrestle backs to win four straight. He then loss to 13th ranked Trevor Chinn of Lehigh to take him out of contention of placing. All our guys learned a lot from this weekend and it's these losses and wins that are the building blocks to put us in contention of our goals! We now go back to training hard before the guys leave for Christmas break. We will be back on the mat December 29-30 at the Midland Championships and then right back on January 3rd at the Lonestar Duals where we will wrestle Stanford, Cal Poly, and Minnesota.

First week

The first week of season practice is over. Midnight "Matness" went great and begins hopefully the beginning of a Harvard wrestling tradition. The idea of Midnight "Matness" came from none other then Coach Jay Weiss. We wanted something that would define the Harvard Wrestling Team that would excite the guys about the first day of practice. Basketball players do it, and we wrestlers train harder then them... so why can't we do it. The team seemed really excited as Midnight "Matness" approached and it turned out to be a great hour of practice. Muzaffar took them through a tough practice and it looked like they got a lot out of it. The first day of competition is rapidly approaching (Nov. 15). The men are preparing for battle and a long fun year.

The End of Preseason, the Beginning of Season!

The dreaded stadium as you alumni probably remember it as, has completed the preseason phase of our training! The wrestlers couldn't have finished as a unit any better. It was amazing to see them just kill the stadium. We had a great beginning of this 2008-2009 season, and as these men move forward to our team goals the hard work will pay off. We start official practice on the 15th of October, tomorrow... which means we kick off the first ever Midnight "Matness," tonight at midnight! More to come about this in tomorrow"s blog.

The long awaiting season!!

It has been a while since we last updated our blog.... and I apologize. I promise to keep all you Harvard Wrestling Fans updated as we head into a new 2008-2009 season. We, as a coaching staff are very excited for this upcoming season. We have brought onto our staff a new volunteer assistant to replace Jesse Jantzen who has finished up his wrestling career and will move on to accomplish far great things in this world. Muzaffar Abdurakhmanov our new volunteer assistant for the 2008-2009 season is one of the most accomplished wrestlers in American University history and our team is already gaining from the vast knowledge and technique he has to offer. We have finished up our first week of preseason training, usually not a fun week, but our team is stepping up to the challenge of an Ivy League Title! The team is looking good as we are training 4 days a week. They are doing a team lift 2 days and a conditioning lift led by Muzaffar on the other day. The guys are running three days either a distance run around Boston or timed run on the track and one day we are getting on the mat for technique. We hope to keep the guys excited as they are entering into a new school year and preseason being draining on them, but keeping our sites on an Ivy League Title will keep them training hard. More to come in the future.

ESU Open

We opened up this weekend at the ESU Open. I was eagerly awaiting to get started this season. I knew the preseason was a good one and I wanted to see the guys in action. JP O'Connor picked up where he left off and placed first and looked real good doing it. Corey Jantzen placed 3rd in his first collegiate tournament. He lost a tough one in the semis but looked very tough throughout the day. Andy Olsen, another freshman, placed 4th and did a great job. We went without 3 of our best wrestlers. Robbie Preston will join us second semester while Andrew Flanagan (157) and Louis Caputo (184) are nursing injuries and should rejoin lineup very soon. Everyone looked good. It was a crazy tournament because there were so many entries that mid afternoon they just stopped having wrestle-back matches. We would've never finished the tournament if we didn't do that. Unfortunately that cut into some matches our guys could've had though. If they lost before the semis, they were done. We definitely have some work to do before Vegas. This week is a short week with Thanksgiving so its very important that we are efficient in our workouts. We give them Thursday, Friday and Saturday off with our return practice on Sunday evening which will be open to the public. We got through the tournament pretty much injury free. Andy Olsen sprained his knee in his last match but hopefully it isn't too bad. That's one of the biggest concerns in these early tournaments but we got through pretty smoothly. Vegas is looming and we need to perform well!

Season is upon us

We are just about to start our competition season. This is a great time because everyone is so excited to get after it. Its been a long preseason and in my opinion, one of our best to date. The guys worked very hard and very smart. We did some different things this year which I feel really paid off. We are somewhat healthy, aside from a few bumps. Our main problem this preseason has been skin infections which have kept a large number of guys off the mat. I think it came at a good time though so it was a good break. This team is really coming together. We have such a good group that is bonding. I always tell them that you can do special things with special people. Our young guys are doing a great job acclimating to college life on and off the mat. We have gotten over a big hump now that our competition schedule is upon us. Now they can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Academically they all have been terrific, which obviously puts a smile on my face. New competition will be great from them all since I am sure they are feeling the growing pains of becoming a collegiate wrestler. Things pick up quickly as we break for Thanksgiving after the ESU tournament and then head to Vegas for a big tournament. Our leaders are doing a great job, anchored by captain Louis Caputo '09. Robbie Preston '09 is our other captain and he will be joining us 2nd semester. Many other guys on the team have stepped up into a leadership role with has been outstanding. J.P. O'Connor '10 is starting the season ranked #5 in the NCAA and is a great leader of our team. We will make bigger strides once we start competing!