Excess Contributions to terminated Money Purchase Plan

[dmb]

An employer sold his company as of November 16, 2000 and terminated his owner only money purchase plan that same date. However, for whatever reason, he over-contributed for the last plan year and now has excess contributions in the plan that cannot be carried over since the plan has terminated. Is the excess contribution treated as a reversion and if so is there a way to reduce the reversion penalty from 50% to 20% since he is the only participant in the plan???