The Minnesota Storm wrestling club's Hayden Zillmer won the senior freestyle championship at 92 kilograms at the U.S. World Team Trials on Sunday in Rochester, while teammate Tony Nelson lost his best-of-three finals series at 125 kg.
Zillmer, a former North Dakota State standout from Crosby, Minn., beat two-time junior college national champion Deron Winn 8-2 and 9-7, winning the second match by rallying from a 7-3 deficit in the final 1:34 that included a pair of two-point moves in the final 39 seconds.
Zillmer advanced to the Final X series on June 23 in Bethlehem, Pa., where he'll face 2016 Olympic bronze medalist J'Den Cox for a spot on the U.S. team that will compete in the World Championships on Oct. 20-28 in Budapest, Hungary.
Nelson, a two-time NCAA champion for the Gophers, lost 6-1 and 10-4 to Adam Coon, the 2018 NCAA runner-up for Michigan who also won the U.S. Open title in May. Coon advanced to the Final X series in Bethlehem, where he'll face world bronze medalist Nick Gwiazdowski. Nelson made the best-of-three finals by edging Storm teammate and training partner Gable Steveson on a tiebreaker in the challenge tourney title match.
Randy Johnson
