Maroulis Dominates Bronze Match, Winchester Will Wrestle Again
Maroulis, pictured here in 2017, completed her journey back to the Olympics with a bronze medal. Photo courtesy of Tony Rotundo / WrestlersAreWarriors.com
by Derek Levendusky, AWW staff writer
Twitter: @AWWderek
Helen Maroulis faced Mongolia’s Khongorzul Boldsaikhan in the bronze medal match early Thursday morning and dominated the contest, winning by 11-0 technical superiority and gaining her second Olympic medal.
Maroulis started the scoring by snapping down the Mongolian and running the corner to get the first 2 in the middle of the first period. She scored again on a 2-on-1 pull down to go up 4-0. Boldsaikhan nearly scored at the end of the first with an underhook throw-by to single, but the clock expired for the break, giving Maroulis a 4-0 lead at the halfway point. Maroulis continued to control the ties, getting another 2-on-1 go behind early in the second. She followed that with a counter on a bad shot for another 2 to go up 9-0, and then got a turn on a hip-to-hip whizzer to seal the match 11-0 and win the bronze, her second Olympic medal in four years.
Meanwhile, 53 kg Jacarra Winchester started off her Olympic experience with a 7-4 win over Russia’s Olga Khoroshavtseva 7-4. The American had to come from behind, down 4-1 at one point, to win the match. In the quarters, she fell to China’s Pang Qianyu 6-2 and put her fate in the hands of her opponent to see if she’d be brought back into the tournament. Pang would have to make the finals for this to happen. In the early hours of Thursday morn, Pang got it done for Winchester against two-time world champion Vanesa Kaladzinskaya, scoring a takedown in the final seconds to win it 2-2 by criteria and bring Winchester back into repechage.
The United States’ 50 kg rep Sarah Hildebrandt received her draw on Wednesday, and the lot fell to Turkey’s Evin Demirhan. Hildebrandt is also on the opposite side of the bracket of two-time world champion Yui Susaki of Japan and #1 seed Mariya Stadnik of Azerbaijan.
Maroulis’ earlier rounds
Maroulis shot out of the gate in the first round with a win over the very tough Chinese opponent Ningning Rong. She overcame a slow start to storm back and win the match 8-4. U.S. women’s coach Terry Steiner had previously said that this would be an important match for Maroulis, knowing how tough her young opponent would be.
When Helen Maroulis stepped on the mat in the 57 kg semifinal against Japan’s Risako Kawai, it was a battle of returning Olympic gold medalists. Kawai also has three world titles under her belt, winning the World Championships from 2017-2019. Meanwhile, Maroulis has two world titles on top of her Olympic gold, so the pedigree was palpable. Maroulis is up a weight class from 2016, and Kawai is down a weight. In the end it was a battle of shot clock points, with Kawai coming out on top 2-1.
With little action in the first period, Kawai was ahead 1-0 at the break. Then Maroulis was put on the clock early in the second period for the second straight time, an unusual decision for the official on the mat, as normally the other wrestler would be put on the clock. American fans and wrestling media have been critical of the officiating to allow the match to go this way, when it appeared Maroulis was on the offensive at the time she was put on the shot clock for the second time. Maroulis failed to score again during the 30-second clock, creating a 2-0 deficit, a gap that felt a little wider against a master defensive wrestler like Kawai. The American scored late when Kawai was finally put on the clock, but it wouldn’t be enough, sending Kawai to the finals and Maroulis to one of the bronze matches.
Kawai’s sister also made the finals at 62 kg.
There were a lot of questions surrounding Maroulis heading into Tokyo. The returning gold medalist did not look herself when she competed at the Poland Open in June, where she fell to Ukraine’s Tetyana Kit 8-2 and Nigeria’s Odunayo Adekuoroye 13-0. But she looked like a new wrestler with a new fire in the first two rounds at the Olympics, and though she lost to Kawai in the semis, Maroulis showed that she was at the top of her game again in dominating the bronze match.
The American now has the distinction of being a two-time Olympic medalist, and the wrestling community will wait with interest to see what Maroulis plans to do moving forward with her career.