Rob Koll: 'Yianni Is Definitely Going To Take An Olympic Redshirt'

Rob Koll: 'Yianni Is Definitely Going To Take An Olympic Redshirt'

Cornell Big Red head coach Rob Koll revealed that two-time NCAA champ Yianni Diakomihalis will definitely take an Olympic redshirt this season.

Aug 4, 2019 by Andrew Spey
Yianni/McKenna NCAA Final

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Cornell Big Red head coach Rob Koll revealed that two-time NCAA champ Yianni Diakomihalis will take an Olympic redshirt this upcoming NCAA season.

Koll spoke to Trackwrestling at the NWCA Convention in Fort Lauderdale, Flordia about a variety of topics, but the most relevant to the NCAA season was when Koll was asked about the potential for Yianni to defer eligibility to pursue an Olympic Gold medal at Tokyo 2020. Coach Koll was clear about that prospect.

Yianni is definitely going to take an Olympic redshirt year. There's no doubt about that. It would be selfish of me not to encourage him to do so.

Coach Koll also revealed that their protest of Yianni's second match with Zain Retherford from Final X: Rutgers will proceed with arbitration on August 8, with a decision rendered that day or soon thereafter. 

The arbitrators could rule for three different options 1) that Yianni won round 2, which would force a third decisive match for the 2019 65kg senior world team spot; 2) that Zain rightfully won the match, making Zetherford the American rep in Kazakhstan; or 3) that the second match should be re-wrestled, restarting the best-of-three series with Zain leading 1-0. 

Watch Yianni's first match with Zain below: 

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The second bout, which is subject to the current dispute, is below:

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Coach Koll was slightly more coy about the potential for three other Cornell starters to take Olympic redshirts, with 125-pound All-American Vito Arujau, 174-pounder Andrew Berreyesa, and 184-pound NCAA runnerup Max Dean all with Olympic redshirt eligibility. 

Cornell will see the return of 2018 All-American 197-pounder Ben Darmstadt after he missed all of last season due to injury. Coming back with sophomore eligibility, Darmstadt may move down to 184, taking over a potentially vacated spot from Dean.

With all that happening, Cornell's lineup for the 2019-20 season could look as follows (with all the caveats of trying to predict a line up in August that apply):

125 - SR Noah Baughman/SO Dominic LaJoie

133 - SR Chas Tucker

141 - SO Michael Venosa/JR Max Pickett/FR Phillip Moomey

149 - JR Richard Hunter/FR Colton Yapoujian/SR Chris Shoenherr

157 - JR Adam Santoro/SR Fredy Stroker

165 - SR Milk Dawkins/FR Andrew Merola

174 - SR Brandon Womack

184 - SO Ben Darmstadt

197 - FR Jacob Cardenas/FR Lewis Fernandes

285 - SO Brendan Furman


And then in 2020-21 Cornell's (HIGHLY SPECULATIVE) lineup could be:

125 - SO Vito Arujau/FR Greg Diakomihalis

133 - SO Vito Arujau/FR Greg Diakomihalis

141 - JR Yianni Diakomihalis/FR Josh Saunders

149 - JR Yianni Diakomihalis/FR Josh Saunders

157 - SR Adam Santoro

165 - SO Andrew Berreyesa/SO Andrew Merola

174 - FR Chris Foca/Julian Ramirez

184 - JR Ben Darmstadt/JR Max Dean

197 - JR Ben Darmstadt/JR Max Dean

285 - SO Lewis Fernandes/JR Brendan Furman


Click here for the entire interview with Coach Koll.