Alex Dieringer Falls to Bo Nickal at Nittany Lion Wrestling Club Event

Three-time NCAA champion and former Oklahoma State Cowboy Alex Dieringer went up to 190 pounds to meet fellow three-time NCAA champion and former Penn State Nittany Lion Bo Nickal on Saturday at the live Nittany Lion Wrestling Club Event on Rokfin.

Dieringer started things off with an early push-out in the first period to go up 1-0. It stayed even on their feet for the rest of the period and Dieringer held that 1-0 lead going into the second.

Dieringer was put on the shot clock with around 1:30 left in the match. Dieringer was unable to score and Nickal tied it up 1-1. Dieringer was still down on criteria and fought inside and tried for some shots in the last 20-30 seconds and was unable to get anything. Nickal won the match 1-1 on criteria for scoring the last point.

For some of the more casual fans of wrestling, the shot clock in freestyle is somewhat arbitrary. If a ref determines that a wrestler is not pushing the pace of the match enough or trying to work to score then they can be put on the “shot clock”. And if they do not score within that 30-second shot clock then they give up a point. In a tied 1-1 freestyle match the criteria for who wins is the person who scored last. Because Nickal scored on that shot clock point, he won the match.

Naturally there is some controversy associated with the criteria rules that decide a match like that. Many would say that wrestling as a whole needs to come up with something different, possibly overtime or something of that nature.

But Twitter was abuzz regarding whether or not he should have even been put on the shot clock.

Dieringer seemed to be the guy that was creating all of the action and offense in the match, but was still put on the shot clock late. Unfortunately with guys at the level of Bo Nickal and Alex Dieringer, whoever gets put on the shot clock with a minute and a half left in the match is probably going to lose and that’s what happened.

Dieringer’s quest for a 2021 Olympic bid continues to move forward. The next time we will likely see him is at the US Senior Nationals in October.