On Friday at Final X, Team USA will solidify its 2026 Senior World Team — and two former Huskers James Green and Ridge Lovett will compete in Newark, NJ in those best-of-three series.
Lovett will be going for his first World team at the age of 26, while Green will compete to get on his EIGHTH World team at 33 years old. After making his first seven teams at 70
kg, Green has since moved up to 74 kg.
Both Green and Lovett won US Open titles in April, punching their tickets to Final X. They had to wait until the middle of May to find out their opponents — World Team Trials champs Zain Retherford (70 kg) and David Carr (74 kg).
The first round of the series starts at 1 p.m. and will be streamed by FloWrestling. The second match will take place at 4 p.m. with a potential third match taking place after a 30-minute rest period.
Ridge Lovett vs. Zain Retherford
70 kg (154 pounds)
Despite this being his first shot at a Senior World Team, Lovett is well-versed in freestyle. A multi-time Fargo All-American in high school, Lovett was a three-time All-American and 2025 NCAA Champion at Nebraska.
Lovett made it to the World Team Trials semifinal last year shortly after graduating, but this is his first full season focusing on freestyle. After going 0-1 at a Ranking Series event in February with a 5-5 criteria loss to Kazakhstan’s Maiis Aliyev, Lovett is perfect on the year. After knifing through the US Open to secure his spot at Final X, Lovett won gold at the Pan-American Championships and beat four-time World and Olympic medalist Bajrang Punia 14-4 at RAF 09.
At Final X, Lovett will face Zain Retherford. A three-time NCAA champion for Penn State, Retherford won a World gold medal in 2023 after earning silver the year before. After competing at the Olympics at 65 kg in 2024, Retherford has not wrestled. In fact, he was a late entrant at the World Team Trials last month where he earned his spot in Final X.
Since returning from his nearly two-year layoff, Retherford has beaten three straight NCAA Champions — Landon Robideau and Caleb Henson at Trials, and Antrell Taylor at RAF 09.
Now, he’ll get a shot at a fourth in Lovett.
This matchup is interesting because Lovett is a guy who loves to mix it up and thrives in the chaos. In contrast, Retherford is quite the opposite — he’s positionally sound, has elite defense and strength, and doesn’t tend to find himself in positions he doesn’t want to be in.
That will be the key for Lovett — can he open Retherford up? If Lovett can force wrestling positions and action, he has a great shot at earning his first Senior World Team spot, but if he can’t it will be a long day for him.
James Green vs. David Carr
74 kg (163 pounds)
An assistant coach for Nebraska, Green is certainly the underdog here, but his experience is invaluable. As a seven-time World-Teamer and a two-time World medalist, Green has been in there with some of the best wrestlers on the globe — only that was down at 70 kg. Now, Green is up to 74 kg where he looked good at the US Open, but can he hold up against the best guys up nearly 10 pounds?
Green has historically had a lot of success against his fellow Americans — he has a career 70-19 record against domestic competition. Green has made a few trips down to 65 kg in search of an Olympic spot in the past, but it hasn’t always gone well, accounting for eight of those 19 losses (he’s 2-8 at 65 kg against Americans). At 70 kg where he thrived for years, Green is 64-11 against domestic competition. After losing to Nick Marable for the spot in 2014 while still in college, Green hasn’t dropped a series for a World team spot since — he’s 7-1 in those best-of-three final series.
Green made his first Senior-level team in 2015 just months after graduating from Nebraska as a four-time All-American — he went on to win a bronze medal. Two years later in 2017, Green made it to the World final and came away with silver. He retired briefly in 2022-23 after having a partial hip replacement but returned to the mat in 2024.
At the US Open in April at 74 kg, Green blew through a bracket where Carr finished fourth, downing Kannon Webster 5-4 in the final to earn his spot in Final X. Green beat the two wrestlers who beat Carr in that tournament — Cam Amine and Joe Sealey.
Carr had to go to the World Team Trials to qualify. He squeaked out a couple last-second matches to get to the final where he faced 18-year-old Jayden James, a U17 World Champion. Carr built up a lead before nearly dropping the match in the end as James put on a furious comeback — Carr won the match 9-7 to secure his spot in Final X.
Last year, Carr beat Mitchell Mesenbrink at Final X before placing 5th at the World Championships. He dropped tight matches to two of the best in the world — 7-5 loss to Cherman Valiev of Albania (World silver and Olympic bronze), and a 2-2 criteria loss to Zaurbek Sidakov of Russia (Olympic gold and three-time World champion).
Carr was a two-time NCAA Champion for Iowa State and a Junior World Champion in 2019 — he’s elite, especially in freestyle. He will be a tough match for Green in this one, but I have faith that Green can get it done.
The only question is which David Carr will we see? Will we see the version that pushed Sidakov to the brink last year? Or, will we see the version that we’ve seen so far in 2026 who has taken some losses and had to squeak by a few guys he probably shouldn’t have?
