One of Edinboro’s all-time greats is coming back home and joining the Fighting Scots coaching staff. This afternoon Edinboro announced that three-time NCAA All-American AJ Schopp will join the staff at his alma mater as the team’s head assistant coach. 
Schopp has spent the last seven seasons on the Purdue Boilermakers coaching staff. A career 133 lber, Schopp undoubtedly had to work closely with Purdue’s 2023 NCAA finalist Matt Ramos and two-time Big Ten runner-up Devin Schroder - both of whom were 125 lbers. During his time in West Lafayette, Purdue sent 47 wrestlers to the NCAA Tournament. Ramos’ 2023 run accounted for the only All-American finish; however, Schroeder and three other teammates were named NWCA first-team All-Americans after the 2020 tournament was canceled. 
Quickly after his career at Edinboro was finished, Schopp got into the coaching ranks by spending two years as an assistant at South Dakota State. While with the Jackrabbits, 133 lber Seth Gross captured the program’s first Big 12 championship and advanced to the NCAA finals. 
As a student-athlete at Edinboro, Schopp amassed a career record of 133-17. His winning percentage (.887) remains second in school history. During each of his final three seasons at Edinboro Schopp got on the NCAA podium finishing fourth twice, before ending his career in third. 
That third-place finish occurred the hard way, as Schopp was upset in the first round and reeled off seven straight wins (four via fall) to finish third. He finished his tournament with a 4-3 win over the top-seeded Big Ten champion Chris Dardanes of Minnesota. Schopp's barrage of bonus points in the consolation bracket helped lead Edinboro to a team trophy and a third-place finish at the 2015 NCAA Tournament. 
Schopp also claimed EWL championships in each of his first three seasons and was an NCAA Round of 12 finisher as a freshman. 
Schopp’s experience coaching in the Big Ten, coupled with his name recognition within the Fighting Scots program, will be invaluable to an Edinboro squad that went 2-12 in 2023-24 and did not have an NCAA qualifier. Edinboro does have a very talented lightweight joining the fold in the fall as the team has signed two-time Pennsylvania finalist Chris Vargo of Bentworth High School. Vargo made national headlines by defeating Jax Forrest in the regional tournament.

The World OG Qualifier, otherwise known as the “Last Chance Qualifier” got underway this morning from Istanbul, Turkey. The tournament serves as the last opportunity for wrestlers to qualify for the 2024 Olympic Games. Anyone who advances to the finals automatically earns an Olympic quota for their country. Repechage is conducted, as well, and the two bronze medalists at each weight class will square off for the final Olympic bid. 
Today, Greco-Roman was front and center. The American team needed to qualify each of the first three Greco weights, 60, 67, and 77 kg. The team went 1-3 on the day and none of them will advance to Paris via a finals appearance. 
Two of them have been eliminated, Dalton Roberts at 60 kg and Ellis Coleman at 67 kg. Roberts went 0-1 and Coleman was 1-1 and both of their opponents lost prior to the finals. The United States will not be represented at the Olympic Games at either weight class. 
The 2012 Olympian Coleman got the day started at 67 kg with a 1-1 victory over Aliaksandr Liavonchyk (AIN - Belarus). Both wrestlers earned their respective points via passivity. Coleman’s came in the second period when he had criteria on his side. A match later, he fell to Switzerland’s Andreas Vetsch, 8-1. Vetsch would go on to lose his next bout in the quarterfinals. 
After a day of competition, the only American Greco-Roman wrestler with Olympic hopes still alive is Kamal Bey at 77 kg. Bey was beaten, 8-0, by Sergei Kutuzov (AIN - Russia); however, Kutuzov continued to win all the way through the semifinals. 
Bey will drop into tomorrow’s repechage rounds. He’ll have Tsimur Berdyieu (AIN - Belarus), a two-time world fifth-place finisher and a bronze medalist in 2017 at the U23 tournament in Europe. He’ll need a total of four wins to earn qualification into the 2024 Olympic Games. 
Like Bey, Roberts dropped his opening match of the day, 11-6. He was down 7-0 in the second period; however, Roberts rallied in the final stanza to make his opponent, Viktor Petryk, sweat a bit. Perhaps too much as Petryk was pinned in his next bout, eliminating Roberts. 
 
American Results
60 kg
Round of 32: Viktor Petryk (Ukraine) over Dalton Roberts  11-6
 
67 kg
Round of 32: Ellis Coleman over Aliaksandr Liavonchyk (Belarus)  1-1
Round of 16: Andreas Vetsch (Switzerland) over Ellis Coleman  8-1
 
77 kg
Sergei Kutuzov (AIN - Russia) over Kamal Bey  8-0
 

More big news on the college coaching front! Today’s edition comes courtesy of the University of Pittsburgh and Keith Gavin, who has hired Lou Rosselli as an assistant coach. 
Rosselli gets back into the collegiate coaching game after sitting out the 2023-24 campaign. He was most recently the head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners, a position he held for seven seasons. During his time in Norman, Rosselli produced four All-Americans after sending 48 wrestlers to the NCAA Tournament. In 2021, Rosselli’s squad claimed the school’s first Big 12 championship in almost 20 years (2002). 
Prior to his tenure as the Sooners head coach, Rosselli spent ten years on the Ohio State bench. He was a part of the Buckeyes 2015 national championship-winning team and an instrumental member of Ohio RTC freestyle staff. 
Before Ohio State, Rosselli spent 11 years assisting at his alma mater, Edinboro and was a 1996 Olympian. 
Rosselli and Gavin are no strangers - their paths have crossed professionally on two occasions. Gavin spent time with the Ohio RTC training in freestyle under Rosselli. He then was a member of Rosselli’s staff at Oklahoma for a year before accepting the head coaching position at Pittsburgh. 
The 2024-25 Pittsburgh squad should be younger than in recent years; yet it could feature a lineup that contains six past national qualifiers.