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Today the Big Ten released its pre-seeds for this weekend's conference championship tournament at Iowa's venerable Carver Hawkeye Arena. The few questions we had remaining have mostly been answered. Let's jump into the pre-seeds and what they mean for our No.1 ranked Penn State Nittany Lions.
Hold On - I'm New To Wrestling
New to wrestling? Here's what you need to know.
- First things first: welcome to wrestling. It's a lot of fun.
- Next, Penn State just dominated the regular season, outscoring opponents 548 - 132. That's pretty good.
- PSU has been ranked No.1 all season long, actually.
- And they won the inaugural Dual Championship Series in convincing fashion. Think of that as the regular season championship.
- But now that it's March, wrestling switches to the post-season and individual tournaments. First up are conference championships. Ours is the Big Ten.
- Last week, the NCAA awarded automatic bids to NCAAs. "7" bids at 125lbs means our Penn Stater has to finish within the top-7 at Big Tens to earn the automatic spot at NCAAs.
- How did the NCAA decide the Big Ten got 7 bids? It's a long and complicated process. But trust us - it works, and it's fair.
- What happens if our Penn Stater doesn't get one of the automatic bids at his weight class? He has to wait out the NCAA's "at-large" selection. Meaning, it's no longer in his control - his fate is decided by gray-haired people on a conference call. Not fun.
- So, uh...what are "pre-seeds"? It's the conference's first pass at seeding the wrestlers for Big Tens. On or around Thursday of this week, the 14 Big Ten wrestling coaches will meet, at Iowa (since that's where the conference tournament is being held), and argue about these pre-seeds. On Friday, the final brackets - with finalized seeds - are released. So...expect some movement from these "pre-seeds", but typically, not a whole lot. You won't see some wrestler pre-seeded 1st fall to 4th, or vice versa. One, maybe two spots is about it - and not a whole lot of that.
- Good? Good. Let's take a look at each of our 10 Nittany Lions.
Here's An Empty Bracket
What happens if the 7-seed loses to the 2-seed in the quarterfinals? Who does the 7-seed face next in the wrestlebacks? Glad you asked. Here's what an empty bracket - both halves - looks like. The 7-seed loses to the 2-seed in bout "L", and falls to the wrestlebacks, where he'll face the winner of "Loser of A vs. Loser of B".
125 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 7
1. Nathan Tomasello, OSU
2. Thomas Gilman, IOWA
3. Nico Megaludis, PSU
4. Tim Lambert, NEB
5. Elijah Oliver, IND
6. Johnny Jimenez, WIS
7. Conor Youtsey, MICH
8. Sean McCabe, RU
133 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 9
1. Zane Richards, ILL
2. Cory Clark, IOWA
3. Jordan Conaway, PSU
4. Geoff Alexander, MD
5. Eric Montoya, NEB
6. Ryan Taylor, WIS
7. Johnni DiJulius, OSU
8. Rossi Bruno, MICH
9. Dom Malone, NU
10. Anthony Giraldo, RU
11. Luke Welch, PUR
12. Garth Yenter, MSU
13. Alonzo Shepherd, IND
14. Sam Brancale, MINN
141 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 7
1. Micah Jordan, OSU
2. Tommy Thorn, MINN
3. Anthony Ashnault, RU
4. Jameson Oster, NU
5. Javier Gasca III, MSU
6. Anthony Abidin, NEB
7. Danny Sabatello, PUR
8. Jimmy Gulibon, PSU
149 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 6
1. Zain Retherford, PSU
2. Brandon Sorensen, IOWA
3. Jake Sueflohn, NEB
4. Jason Tsirtsis, NU
5. Alec Pantaleo, MICH
6. Alex Griffin, PUR
7. Andrew Crone, WIS
8. Jake Short, MINN
157 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 7
1. Jason Nolf, PSU
2. Isaiah Martinez, ILL
3. Richie Lewis, RU
4. Jake Ryan, OSU
5. Edwin Cooper, Jr., IOWA
6. Brian Murphy, MICH
7. Tyler Berger, NEB
8. Lou Mascola, MD
165 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 6
1. Isaac Jordan, WIS
2. Bo Jordan, OSU
3. Steven Rodrigues, ILL
4. Anthony Perrotti, RU
5. Chad Welch, PUR
6. Austin Wilson, NEB
7. Geno Morelli, PSU
8. Patrick Rhoads, IOWA
174 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 9
1. Bo Nickal, PSU
2. Alex Meyer, IOWA
3. Zach Brunson, ILL
4. Myles Martin, OSU
5. Nathan Jackson, IND
6. Micah Barnes, NEB
7. Nick Wanzek, MINN
8. Ricky Robertson, WIS
9. Phil Bakuckas, RU
10. Mitch Sliga, NU
11. Aaron Calderon, MICH
12. Josh Snook, MD
13. Shane Shadaia, MSU
14. Andrew Hoselton, PUR
184 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 7
1. Dom Abounader, MICH
2. Matt McCutcheon, PSU
3. Sam Brooks, IOWA
4. TJ Dudley, NEB
5. Nick Gravina, RU
6. Kenny Courts, OSU
7. Jeff Koepke, ILL
8. Ryan Christensen, WIS
197 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 6
1. Morgan McIntosh, PSU
2. Brett Pfarr, MINN
3. Nathan Burak, IOWA
4. Max Huntley, MICH
5. Aaron Studebaker, NEB
6. Mark Martin, OSU
7. Hayden Hrymack, RU
8. Jacob Cooper, MSU
285 LBS
NCAA Automatic Bids: 7
1. Adam Coon, MICH
2. Kyle Snyder, OSU
3. Sam Stoll, IOWA
4. Billy Smith, RU
5. Michael Kroells, MINN
6. Collin Jensen, NEB
7. Brooks Black, ILL
8. Nick Nevills, PSU
Overall
These pre-seeds - except for Jimmy - are about what we expected, if not a little bit better than we expected. If the tournament wrestles exactly to these pre-seeds, here is what the final standings would look like, without bonus points of course.
WT | PSU | Iowa | OhSt | MICH | NEB | ILL |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
125 | 12.5 | 15 | 19 | 5.5 | 11.5 | 0 |
133 | 12.5 | 15 | 5.5 | 4.5 | 9 | 19 |
141 | 4.5 | 0 | 19 | 0 | 8 | 0 |
149 | 19 | 15 | 0 | 9 | 12.5 | 0 |
157 | 19 | 9 | 11.5 | 8 | 5.5 | 15 |
165 | 5.5 | 4.5 | 15 | 0 | 8 | 12.5 |
174 | 19 | 15 | 11.5 | 0 | 8 | 12.5 |
184 | 15 | 12.5 | 8 | 19 | 11.5 | 5.5 |
197 | 19 | 12.5 | 8 | 11.5 | 9 | 0 |
285 | 4.5 | 12.5 | 15 | 19 | 8 | 5.5 |
TOTAL | 130.5 | 111 | 112.5 | 76.5 | 91 | 70 |