Brothers Marsteller, Stefanowicz look to make Olympic wrestling team this weekend

Brothers and fellow Kennard-Dale High School graduates Chance Marsteller and John Stefanowicz can both punch their tickets to the 2024 Paris Olympics this weekend.

The U.S. Olympic Wrestling Team Trials begin Friday and conclude Saturday at Penn State's Bryce Jordan Center in State College. Marsteller is competing in the 86-kilogram freestyle weight class, while Stefanowicz, who competed in Greco-Roman wrestling at the Tokyo Games in 2021, is in the discipline's 87-kilogram class.

Both brothers will face challenging paths. That's nothing new for either one.

Marsteller is the No. 2 seed in a challenge tournament for his class and will likely need to defeat five decorated wrestlers to claim his spot. That includes 2019 U.S. champion Zahid Valencia, who has a bye to the semifinals of the bracket, and potentially No. 1-seed Aaron Brooks, who last month captured his fourth NCAA championship for Penn State. At the end of the road lies PSU legend David Taylor, the Tokyo gold medalist and two-time reigning world champion who will face the challenge bracket winner in a best-of-three championship series.

Stefanowicz made history in 2021 as the first U.S. Marine to make the Olympic wrestling team since 1992. He is part of a decorated field in the Greco-Roman 87-kilogram bracket, in which two-time Senior World Team member Spencer Woods has a bye to the championship series. The challenge tournament includes 2012 and 2016 U.S. Olympian Ben Provisor, while Mahmoud Sebie recently received U.S. citizenship after representing Egypt in the 2016 Games. Sebie is seeded first with Richard Carlson second, 2023 World Team member Zachary Braunagel third and Stefanowicz fourth.

The trials will be streamed on Peacock. Preliminaries, quarterfinals and consolation rounds for all styles and weights comprise Session 1 from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Friday, while challenge tournament semifinals and finals will follow in Session 2 starting at 6:30. Championship series bouts begin Saturday morning and continue through the evening.

Marsteller will open in the second round against either No. 7-seed Max Dean, a former NCAA champion for Penn State, or No. 10 Evan Wick, a Cal Poly grad. A potential quarterfinal matchup could be against either NC State's Trent Hidlay (the NCAA runner-up to Brooks at 197 pounds) or Carter Starocci, another four-time champ for Penn State.

Stefanowicz's quarterfinal opponent Friday is Timothy Young, with the winner to wrestle Sebie.

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Marsteller, who turns 29 in July, made his first-ever World Team last year by defeating former Olympic gold medalist Jordan Burroughs in the Final X championship series. He went 1-1 in Belgrade, Serbia, in September to finish 14th. With weight classes at the Olympics differing from those at Worlds, Marsteller and Burroughs are in separate brackets this weekend.

The Olympics have long been a dream for Marsteller, and it looked like anything was possible when he went 166-0 with four PIAA titles at Kennard-Dale. He committed to powerhouse Oklahoma State but left the program as a sophomore and was arrested in 2016 for public exposure and assault of police officers while at Lock Haven. He later admitted he was addicted to opioids at the time. After returning to the mat for Lock Haven, however, Marsteller finished his college career as a two-time All-American. While wrestling professionally, he has also entered the coaching realm and continued to share his inspiring story with the next generation.

Stefanowicz, the older brother by nearly four years, never reached a state tournament while at Kennard-Dale and was 5-foot-3 and 125 pounds as a high school senior. Two years later, however, he had grown seven inches and gained 75 pounds. He started wrestling again — this time in the Greco-Roman style, in which holds below the waist are forbidden — while in the armed forces and made the All-Marine wrestling team. Eventually, his competitive fire took him to Team USA and helped send him to the Olympics. Now he's a dream weekend away from going alongside Marsteller.

Haines takes aim: Biglerville graduate Levi Haines is also competing this weekend in the 74-kilogram freestyle class. Haines, a sophomore at Penn State, won the NCAA individual championship at 157 pounds on March 23.

He's the No. 9 seed in the class and will open on Friday morning against teammate and No. 8-seed Alex Facundo, who wrestled at 165 pounds for the Nittany Lions as a redshirt freshman in 2022-23 but took an Olympic redshirt, also known as an "athletic activity waiver," this past season. The winner will battle No. 1-seed Burroughs in the challenge tournament quarterfinals.

A total of 17 current, former or future Penn State wrestlers will partake in freestyle competitions this weekend. The 86-kilogram class alone includes six former Nittany Lion national champions, with Taylor and Brooks leading the charge alongside Mark Hall, Starocci, Max Dean and Connor Mirasola. Zain Retherford has a semifinal bye and Nick Lee is the No. 1 challenge tournament seed at 65 kilograms. Jason Nolf is seeded second and Mitch Mesenbrink is fourth in the 74kg bracket that includes Haines and Facundo. And Greg Kerkvliet is the No. 3 seed at 125kg after winning the NCAA heavyweight title four weeks ago.

A handful of other wrestlers competing this weekend have trained with the Nittany Lion Wrestling Club, including four-time world champion Kyle Dake, who earned a bye to the 74kg championship series.

It'll be an action-packed weekend in State College. And three former York-Adams League wrestlers hope it ends with a ticket to Paris.