Men's Open class competition in judo at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany was held at Judo and Wrestling Hall.

In a surprise Vitali Kuznetsov threw Ruska defeating him using Te Guruma.

Kuznetsov ended up winning the pool allowing Ruska to continue in the repechage.

Ruska ended up facing Kuznetsov in the finals where he used a different game plan, using yoko-shiho-gatame to win the match.

Ruska retired after the Munich Games being the only judoka to win two gold medals in the same Olympics.