U.S. Open Day 2 Recap: Wyatt Hendrickson Wins Championship, U20s Get Started

Captain America is headed back to Final X.

Wyatt Hendrickson won the U.S. Open at 125 kg on Saturday night in Las Vegas. He pinned his finals opponent in just 27 seconds.

He took on Demetrius Thomas in Sunday night’s final, taking the former Pitt Panther down at the whistle, flipping him to his back and pinning him.

It marks the second straight year Hendrickson has won the U.S. Open. The result books his ticket to Final X, where he’ll take on the winner of the World Team Trails in a best-of-three series. The winner of that series will represent the United States at the World Championships.

Hendrickson was one of three Cowboy RTC finalists but the only to win.

Four-time OSU All-American Dustin Plott dropped a close final to Michael Macchiavello at 92 kg, losing 4-3. Plott scored on a chest wrap turn late in the match and kept that chest wrap in search of a some match-winning exposure points, but the clock ran out before he could get the second roll through.

Unfortunately for Plott, there isn’t a World Team Trail at 92 kg because Trent Hidlay took gold at last year’s Worlds, which means he auto-qualifies for Final X.

Joey McKenna was the other Cowboy RTC wrestler in the finals, but he dropped his match to high school phenom Bo Bassett 10-0 at 65 kg. McKenna injured his knee on Bassett’s first takedown, and it seemed to progressively get worse with some ensuing takedowns.

There will be no World Team Trials at this weight either, with Real Woods earning bronze at the World Championships last year.

Jax Forrest wrestled back for third at 61 kg, taking out Iowa’s Austin DeSanto in the third-place bout.

He’ll have to go through the trials to get back on the world team. Penn State’s Marcus Blaze beat Ohio State’s Ben Davino in the final after Davino beat Forrest on Friday. Those three freshmen came in first (Forrest), second (Davino) and fourth (Blaze) at the NCAA Championships last month, so this freestyle battle will only add to their budding rivalry.

Cowboy RTC Senior Placements: 

Wyatt Hendrickson (125 kg) — 1st
Dustin Plott (92 kg) — 2nd
Joey McKenna (65 kg) — 2nd
Jax Forrest (61 kg) — 3rd
Cameron Amine (74 kg) — 5th
Cody Merrill (92 kg) — 7th
Dean Hamiti (79 kg) — 8th
Caleb Fish (74 kg) — DNP

U20s Get Started

The Cowboys are also well represented in the U20 U.S. Open brackets, which started Saturday.

I think I have everyone accounted for, but there are so many guys in these brackets that it feels like picking needles out of a haystack. Here’s how each guy did:

Luke Hamiti* (79 kg) — 1-2
Beau Hickman (70 kg) — 3-2
Tanner Hodgins# (92 kg) — 2-0
Ladd Holman# (92 kg) — 2-0
Ronnie Ramirez (61 kg) — 4-0
Landon Robideau (70 kg) — 4-0
Michael Romero# (70 kg) — 3-2
Dreshaun Ross* — (125 kg) — 2-0
Kody Routledge — (74 kg) — 4-0

*Notes Class of 2026 Signee
#Notes 2027 commit