WRESTLING ROUNDUP

The Associated Press

Updated: 1:53 p.m. ET Aug. 22, 2004

ATHENS, Greece - The United States had been confident of coming away from the first Olympic women’s wrestling tournament with the maximum four medals. Now it can get only two, and even those aren’t a certainty.
 

Patricia Miranda was the only American who didn’t lose Sunday on a disappointing but not entirely disastrous day for Team USA, which advanced Sara McMann into the semifinals despite a loss but saw star Toccara Montgomery done in by a terrible draw.
 

Montgomery was matched with five-time world champion Kyoko Hamaguchi of Japan in a blind draw — a rematch of last year’s world finals at 158½ pounds (72kg) — and lost 8-4, costing her any chance of medaling.
 

“It’s a hit for us,” Miranda said.
 

So was losing Tela O’Donnell, the only U.S. team member who didn’t get a silver in last year’s world championships. Making her world-level debut, O’Donnell was eliminated from medal contention at 121 pounds (55kg) with an 11-1 loss to Canada’s Tonya Verbeek, despite pinning Russia’s Olga Smirnova in her opening match.

Miranda, from Saratoga, Calif., was easily the best U.S. wrestler, beating former world champion Li Hui of China 8-5, Larisa Oorzhak of Russia 7-3 and Caripa Mayelis of Venezuela 11-1 to win her four-woman pool at 105½ pounds (48kg).
 

Miranda also has a tough draw in the semifinals, a rematch of her 5-4 world championships final loss to Irina Merlini of Ukraine. Merlini powered through her four-woman pool Sunday with a fall and decisions of 11-0 and 10-0.
 

“It’s been a long time coming,” said Miranda, the soon-to-be Yale Law School student who has replayed that loss to Merlini countless times in her mind.
 

All three wrestlers in McMann’s 138½ pounds (63kg) pool went 1-1, but McMann advanced despite losing 5-2 to Canada’s Viola Yanik because of her opening-match pin of former world champion Meng Lily of China. McMann meets Greece’s Stavroula Zigouri in the semifinals Monday.
 

McMann knew beforehand she could be eliminated only if she lost by fall. Pools are decided by technical points, not won-lost records, and falls accumulate more technical points than decisions do.
 

“I’ve wrestled her (Yanik) like 10 times and won every one,” McMann said. “All I had to do was not get pinned and I wrestled like that. Sometimes it’s not good to have that knowledge.”
 

Montgomery also knew there was little chance of medaling if she lost to Hamaguchi, only to fall behind 3-0 in the opening 11 seconds and never recover. She bounced back to win her second pool match and stay in contention for a fifth-place finish.

Montgomery’s loss was her third in four matches to Hamaguchi, a tough-looking and technically sound wrestler who is the daughter of longtime Japanese pro wrestling star Heigo “The Animal” Hamaguchi.
 

It was just the match Montgomery didn’t want in her Olympic debut after spending years wrestling on her Cleveland high school’s boys team and moving to a small Kentucky town to attend one of only six U.S. colleges with a women’s wrestling team.
 

“I just didn’t wrestle well,” Montgomery said. “I’m always down after a loss. What can you do?”
 

Montgomery’s disappointment went even deeper because this likely will be her only Olympics. Though she is only 21, she expects to graduate from Cumberland College next year, then enter the job market. She plans to stay in sports, just not wrestling.

“I’m going to find a sport where you don’t have to make weight,” she said.
 

While it was a so-so day for the United States, Japan’s mat powerhouse rolled on. Hamaguchi and three other world champions all advanced easily: Saori Yoshida (121 pounds), Kaori Icho (138½ pounds) and sister Chiharu Icho (48 pounds).