It may not have counted for much beyond pride and practice, but wrestling notched an exhibition victory over the NAIA’s No. 11 Menlo College this past Saturday. At the Ford Center, in front of a home crowd that included new football coach Jim Harbaugh and Athletic Director Bob Bowlsby, the Cardinal put forth another solid showing, winning 29-14, as the team heads into the heart of its Pac-10 season.

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John Shen

Senior Brian Perry battles Menlo College’s Stephen Towne in last Friday’s exhibition match at Burnham Pavilion. Perry won after a difficult start in a lopsided 9-1 decision, giving the Cardinal a 15-11 lead that carried through to defeat Menlo 29-14.

The match was originally slated to be a regular-season dual meet, but when the official failed to arrive at the Ford Center, the dual had to be postponed. When no substitute could be found on short notice, an exhibition was wrestled instead. Although Stanford head coach Kerry McCoy was disappointed that the win won’t count in his team’s official record, he was nevertheless pleased with the effort his squad put forth and the progress he’s seen so far.

“It’s just unfortunate, because we wanted to get a win and have a good showing, but realistically it’s all practice until the conference tournament,” McCoy said. “But the goal is to go out and wrestle and get better towards the end of the year, and the guys did well. We got some momentum we can continue to build on next week.”

Stanford went into the meet without No. 17 junior Josh Zupancic at 157 pounds and sophomore Jared Boyer at 197 pounds, both key starters. Nonetheless, when the match opened at 125 pounds, it was all business as usual for the Cardinal, as No. 4 junior Tanner Gardner got things started in his traditionally dominant fashion, with a first period pin at 2:27.

But after Stanford lost three of its next four matches, the overall score was tied 11-11. One particularly difficult loss came as redshirt freshman Matt Kim, wrestling at 141 pounds, pulled ahead of his opponent in the closing seconds of his match with a takedown, only to lose seconds later as Menlo’s Anthony Cunha answered with a quick reversal for the win.

McCoy said that Kim may have been expending too much energy in the first period, leaving him drained in the crucial end stages of the match.

“Just like last week, he fought hard, wrestled with intensity and did all the things we wanted him to do,” McCoy said. “But he just fell a little bit short. It’s going to pay off for him eventually.”

After the rough stretch, it was up to the Cardinal’s lone senior, Brian Perry, to turn the tide as he wrestled at 165 pounds. The hard fought battle didn’t disappoint.

“You could tell the team was a little bit deflated going into my match,” Perry said. “I needed to just do something to boost their spirits a little bit going into the second half of the meet.”

Despite earning a lopsided 9-1 decision, the outcome was in doubt early on, as both Perry and his opponent, Menlo’s Stephen Towne, had difficulty scoring to start the match. But as the third period was grinding to a close, Perry had worn down his opponent and was building a commanding lead when Towne lunged at him in a move that seemed borne out of frustration. Perry threw a hand up into his opponent’s face and managed to stop the charge.

“He’d actually head-butted me, earlier,” Perry said. “It didn’t hurt me at all, luckily, but it was weird. I’ve never had anybody come at me like that before.”

With Perry’s major decision putting the Cardinal up 15-11, Stanford never looked back. The squad won three of the final four matches, with true-freshman Zack Giesen’s match being the most notable, as he scored a sudden pin at 184 pounds in what looked like it was bound to be another drawn-out fight.

“That’s the great thing about wrestling, because at any time, no matter what the situation, you’ve got the pin — just like how in boxing you’ve got the knock-out ,” McCoy said. “[Giesen’s] so strong and so powerful that when he catches a guy in certain positions he can just catch the guy on his back and end it. So, it’s always good to see him rolling. He’s good — he’s good to have for the team and he’s one of our young guys who’s going to be the future of our program for the next few years.”

The Cardinal next faces conference opponents Cal Poly and Oregon this Friday, as their Pac-10 season heats up. Stanford faces the Ducks at 5 p.m., followed by the Mustangs at 7 p.m., in Burnham Pavilion.