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The 2024 U.S. Olympic Team Trials are all set to be held later this week at Penn State. Scheduled between April 19-20, the event will be one last chance for wrestlers around America to earn an Olympic berth in Paris.
The trials will be a two-day event with the first day being a challenger tournament consisting of more than 200 athletes. The winners of the first day will get a chance to compete against the quota-secured wrestlers in a best-of-three format.
The event will include athletes from various categories like 74kg, 86kg, etc. Prominent athletes like Jordan Burroughs, Kyle Dake, and Aaron Brooks among others will be gracing the trials. With so much star power, the event is expected to be a thrilling contest with the Olympic qualification on the line.
With all this said, let's look at the top contests from the 2024 U.S. Olympic Team Trials.
U.S. Olympic Team Trials: Top Match-ups
Jordan Burroughs vs Kyle Dake (74kgs)
Jordan Burroughs and Kyle Dake are two of the most prominent names in the 74kg bracket. Both former Olympic medalists, Dake and Burroughs will have an opportunity on Saturday to go up against each other for a place in the US Olympics wrestling team. Dake has already qualified for the finals but he will have a tough time at Penn State if Burroughs goes through the qualifier stage. Currently, 35-year-old Burroughs leads Dake 7-1 in the head-to-head.
Kyle Snyder vs J'den Cox (97kgs)
Kyle Snyder and J'den Cox will be the forerunners in the 97kg bracket of the U.S. Olympic team trials. Both Snyder and Cox are Olympic medalists and will be in the race for a place in the Paris Olympics team. Both of them have been part of some feisty meetups in the past such as their match in the Final X last year.
Zane Richards vs Thomas Gilman (57kgs)
Zane Richards and Thomas Gilman will be two of the top contestants from the 57kg bracket in the U.S. Olympic team trials in the absence of the 2023 World Championships winner Vito Arujau. Richards will have the upper hand over Gilman, especially after his victory against the 2020 Tokyo Olympics bronze medalist Gilman last year.
David Taylor vs Aaron Brooks (86 kgs)
The 86kg category can see a clash between experience and flamboyancy. On the one hand is the 2020 Tokyo Olympic gold medalist David Taylor while on the other hand is the promising youngster from the Nittany Lions, Aaron Brooks. However, Taylor has already tasted victory against Brooks last year in the Final X when he beat Brooks 6-0, 5-4.
