Utah Valley's Taylor LaMont named NCAA Wrestler of the Week

With 38% majority from the NCAA Wrestling Twitter poll, Taylor LaMont of Utah Valley University has been named NCAA Wrestler of the Week.

The 125-pound redshirt freshman rightly claimed this award after winning out to take home the 125-pound title at last weekend’s Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational. 

LaMont, seeded eighth, went 6-0, including four wins over ranked opponents. LaMont’s tournament run opened with pins over Harvard’s Lukus Stricker and Cal Baptist’s Alex Nunez.

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Continuing his dominance, he then defeated No. 9 Drew Mattin of Michigan in an 8-5 dual. To finish the first day, LaMont won a 4-3 decision over the No. 1 seed and returning NCAA finalist Ethan Lizak of Minnesota. 

Utah Valley's Taylor LaMont is your NCAA Wrestler of the Week! pic.twitter.com/v2UvgnKWAe

— NCAA Wrestling (@ncaawrestling) December 7, 2017

In the following day, he proceeded to the championship match with a win over the No. 5 seed Connor Schram, an outstanding Stanford All-American. In a hard fought dual, LaMont secured the title with a 4-3 victory over No. 3 seed Sean Russell of Edinboro. The impressive performance at the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational launched LaMont up to No. 6 in the nation for the 125-pound weight class by InterMat, FloWrestling and TheOpenMat.

Prior to beginning his wrestling career at UVU, LaMont was a four-time Utah High School State Champion. He went undefeated in his junior and senior seasons at Maple Mountain High School and is known as a four-time Most Outstanding Wrestling. He finished his high school career with an overall record of 244-9. 

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In LaMont’s first year at UVU, he compiled a 20-5 record with title wins at both the Cowboy Open and the UVU Open by going 4-0 and 5-0, respectively. After winning the Cowboy Open in what was his first collegiate event, LaMont was given the Most Outstanding Wrestling award. 

LaMont is also a five-time U.S. World Team member in Greco-Roman. In 2016, he became a Junior World bronze medalist. In his Junior Worlds trip in 2017 LaMont placed sixth at the Greco-Roman World trials, and finished in fourth at the U.S. Senior Nationals in Greco-Roman.

Currently, LaMont’s record stands at 18-2 on the season, and his sixth place ranking is the highest-ever recorded by a Wolverine.