TALLINN, Estonia — University of Michigan sophomore Mason Parris used his signature fireman’s carry and finished it with a first-period fall to defeat Iran’s Amir Hossein Abbas Zare in the gold-medal final at 125kg/275 pounds at the Junior World Championships on Wednesday (Aug. 14) at the Tondiraba Ice Hall.
Parris posted a perfect 4-0 record in his international freestyle debut — coming just a year after his first national freestyle tournament at Fargo last summer. He outscored his opposition, 36-3, and spent just 6:15 on the mat. Not one of his matches lasted a full period.
He pinned Iran’s Zare, a 2018 Cadet World champion and 2018 Youth Olympic Games silver medalist, at the 1:20 mark. After trading stepouts, Parris hit his carry for the go-ahead takedown about 40 seconds in and quickly put Zare to his back. The mat official called for the fall multiple times, but it wasn’t until Parris readjusted with a half that he received confirmation to end the match.
Parris is the third freestyle world gold medalist on the current Wolverine roster, joining sophomore/freshman Will Lewan (2017) and freshman Kurt McHenry (2016, 2017) — both Cadet world champions. Graduate student Stevan Micic also captured a junior world bronze medal in 2015.
Parris rolled into the championship final with three straight technical superiority wins Tuesday (Aug. 13), that included a 13-2 victory over Turkey’s Pasa Ekrem Karabulut — an eventual bronze medalist — in the semifinals. Parris earned four takedowns and a lace to seemingly end the bout, but the Turkish corner won a challenge to adjust the score and prolong the match. Parris quickly finished on a single-leg shot off the ensuing restart to end the match at the 2:00 mark.
The Wolverine opened the tournament with back-to-back 10-0 techs, as he defeated Georgia’s Vasil Khvistani in 2:19 — his longest match of the tournament — on five takedowns in the first round and Mongolia’s Gan Erdene Sodbileg in just 36 seconds on a pair of takedowns and three straight guts in the quarterfinals.
Parris led the Wolverines last season with a 32-9 record and 13 falls after coming out a redshirt as a true freshman. He reached the heavyweight Round of 12 at the NCAA Championships.
