The Day of the Black-Out

Saturday morning started early my alarm went off at 4:30 a.m. I packed up the rest of my things got ready and jumped in my car to drive to the Baltimore airport. I arrived in Cedar Rapids Iowa just a little after noon, and I went straight to the rental car counter. So far the first person I talked to in Iowa was planning to go to the wrestling match as well. So far so good, even though my first flight was delayed I still got there on time.

I then drove to Iowa City to check into my hotel, relax, eat lunch and get a few things done before heading over to the arena. I had been warned by everyone that I had talked to, to get there early.

Although I have been to Iowa quite a few times over the years for wrestling events, I have only ever spent two of them in Iowa City. The first NCAA Tournament that I attended was in 2001 at Carver-Hawkeye Arena.  That was the year that Edinboro crowned our second National Champion in Josh Koscheck and Minnesota won the team title without a champion, although the ten All-Americans they had was not so shabby either.

On Saturday I set foot into Carver-Hawkeye again for the second time, but this time was to see the rivalry match-up of Iowa and Iowa State. The match has been being hyped for a while as the teams were ranked No. 1 and No. 2 respectively.  I got to the arena at 4 p.m. and there were others trying to get in early as well. This is when having a credential really helps; I found my seat on Press Row and started getting my area setup.

Carver-Hawkeye before the doors opened.

In the mean time my night was all about observation.  Click here to read more from Saturday night.

There were 15,955 people in attendance, talk about an observation. I have been to many wrestling events over the years, not once have I been to one that sold out an arena, until Saturday night that is.  It was great seeing that many wrestling fans in one place. The attendance broke an NCAA Record for the most people to attend a dual meet. That is one record that could be hard to beat, unless they find a bigger arena or more standing room.

The crowd was completely electric as the team introductions were being done. They attempted for a “black-out,” so most Hawkeye fans were wearing their black and gold, but when looking around you saw mostly black.  Minus the team in purple that was sitting in the stands and some intermittent burst of Cyclone Red.

I must have been a little to pre-occupied watching wrestling but one of those 15,955 people was Randy Cotour the MMA Fighter.  Although, I did not hear he was there until after the match.

The first takedown of the match that Charlie Falck earned, the crowd just erupted. I thought to myself wow I am glad I brought my Excedrine.

Watching Brent Metcalf wrestle is just plain exciting, he just does not stop. He did put the most team points up on the board for Iowa as he earned a technical fall by a score of 26-10. Metcalf is an intense wrestler and the Hawkeye fans along with most wrestling fans love to watch him out on that mat.

It was amazing seeing that many people in support of one two hour event. Sure in basketball and football crowds like that mean nothing, but it proves that the support is out there we just need to find it and harness all of our energy into bringing it out.

Listening to both coaches in their press conferences afterwards they both thought they could have done better. Tom Brands said they could have put on more of a show for all those people that came out to watch wrestling.  They did not achieve the ultimate scoring machine by getting a fall in any of the matches.  Cael Sanderson said that they lost the close ones that they needed to win, but he still knows that it is early in the season and there is still time between now and March.

All in all it was definitely an experience worth the lack of sleep and the amount of travel necessary to get there.  So Carver-Hawkeye goes 2-for-2  in my book, I have yet to be disappointed by any wrestling I have seen there, but then again that could just be a coincidence.

Rankings/Ratings from “The Stacks”

Since today is traditionally rankings day here at InterMat, it only seems appropriate that we take a look back at rankings randomly pulled off the shelf of “the stacks.”  Going through these rankings you may notice: teams that have jumped divisions, colleges that have changed names, teams that no longer have programs, and that some of the same powerhouses are still around today.

 

Take a look, enjoy and discuss!

 

January 12, 1979

 

Division I Ratings

1. Iowa
2. Iowa State
3. Wisconsin
4. Lehigh
5. Oklahoma State
6. Oregon State
7. Oklahoma
8. Cal Poly
9. Minnesota
10. Bringham Young
11. Louisiana State
12. Clarion State
13. Missouri
14. Michigan State
15. Arizona State
16. Michigan
17. Bloomsburg State
18. Cleveland State
19. Florida
20. Temple

 

Division II Ratings

1. Cal State-Bakersfield
2. Northern Iowa
3. Augustana – S.D.
4. UN-Omaha
5. Northern Michigan
6. SIU- Edwardsville
7. Central Oklahoma
8. South Dakota State
9. North Dakota State
10. Eastern Illinois
11. Northern Colorado
12. Morgan State
13. Springfield
14. Mankato State
15. St. Cloud State
16. Western Illinois
17. CSU-Chico
18. Central Missouri
19. UC-Davis
20. Youngstown

 

Division III Ratings

1. Millersville State
2. St. Lawrence
3. Humboldt State
4. Montclair State
5. Cortland State
6. Trenton State
7. Brockport State
8. Binghamton State
9. SUNY- Buffalo
10. Salisbury State
11. John Carroll University
12. Minnesota-Morris
13. Concordia-Minnesota
14. Hiram College
15. Potsdam State
16. Wartburg College
17. Massachusetts Maritime
18. Ashland College
19. Luther College
20. Baldwin-Wallace

Finally the Season is Here

Finally the season has started. I was a little torn going into the weekend, because there is this struggle for time that goes on at InterMat. One side of my mind was dreading the season because there are so many more things I wanted to have lined and done on the site before the flow of results monopolize my time. The other side of mind was aching to see some actual action and some results that matter. It only took one weekend and I am fully into the season. Here are some of my highlights from the opening weekend:

Super 32:

I’m sad I could not make it down there, because the competition looked to be great as usual. Looking back through the brackets a few things jumped out to me.

First being Robert Dyar of Vestavia Hills, Alabama. Dyar has little by little made me a believer. Dyar on the surface may be knocked for only having one state title in a state that is not a wrestling powerhouse and on top of that it was as a Junior at 103. However, Dyar performed well at both NHSCA’s and Fargo. Then he took second to Devin Carter of Virginia at 112 this weekend. I am not trying to slight Carter, he is the one that took home the belt. I simply want to put Dyar out there as a kid who is turning into a stud and is not from one of the traditional big time wrestling states.

Another runner-up that jumped out to me is Josh Kindig from Pennsylvania. Kindig clearly has already made a name for himself. Kindig’s second place finish is significant because his loses may prove be more telling than his wins. He only loses 1-0 to David Taylor in the Super 32 finals this year. He also wrestled a tight match with Jordan Oliver in last years P.I.A.A. finals and was a double finalist at Fargo where he fell victim to the Alton family. Kindig is certainly one the best wrestlers in the country to not own a state title.

Michigan state champ Jackson Morse ran through the gauntlet at 145. He pinned his first three opponents in less than 4 minutes. The beats Cody Bollinger, Joe Cozart, Dylan Alton, and Joey Napoli. Early season or late season. Short matches or a full six minutes. It doesn’t matter, that is impressive.

College:

The Fighting Scot Duals headlined the weekend with Edinboro downing Army, Findlay, and Maryland. One of the big questions entering this weekend was Matt Kyler’s ability to perform at 149. Kyler puts some of those questions to rest with a strong performance. Kyler recorded a fall against Findlay’s Sean Dong, a major decision over Torsten Gilliespie of Edinboro and a fall against Eric Medina of Maryland. Medina took an early lead, but Kyler tied the match at 5 and then pinned the No. 14 ranked Maryland wrestler. Kyler’s fall provided huge bonus points in a match that ended tied at 19.

Yesterday at the Buffalo Open, Paul Donahoe stepped onto the mat as a Fighting Scot and won the tournament. Donahoe defeated Ohio State’s Nikko Triggas in the finals. Eric Morrill took third place a t 125 for the Scots. At 133 Reece Humphrey took the tournament, but the big news at that weight was Ohio State commitment Ian Paddock taking third. Another high school competitor, James Fleming, a recent Clarion commitment took fourth at 157. Also, two notable transfers won their weights. Garrett Scott rolled through the 141 bracket in his competition since going to Edinboro and Cody Gardner took his first college tournament and did it as an Ohio State Buckeye.

At the Eastern Michigan Open, Pat McCaffery won the tournament at 125 for Navy and Pitt transfer Eric Albright defeated Kenny Jordan in the finals at 133. Mike Letts of Maryland won the 174 bracket and Scott Steele of Navy won at 285.

Those are just some of the highlights of the first weekend of competition on 2008-2009. Next weekend should be equally exciting with many more teams opening their seasons and more off-season questions beginning to be answered. The most exciting part of next weekend for me will be Lehigh versus Maryland. There are several good stories inside the story of that match. I will try to bring some of them to you throughout the week, leading up to InterMat’s live coverage of the dual on Sunday. Hope everyone is enjoying the season as much as I am so far.

Four Points from “The Stacks”

Did you ever have a large stack of magazines just laying around and no clue what to do with them? Well here at the NWCA/InterMat we have quite the collection of old AWN’s, WIN Magazines and USA Wrestling arranged in chronological order and just sitting around. So we thought that it might be interesting to pull some facts and post them from time to time on the InterMat Blog.

Every year it seems there has been a lot of talk about qualifiers from each conference and how many wildcards. Although that system will now be obsolete we did find the breakdown of qualifiers from 1989, including the spots given to the Division II and Division III wrestlers.  We have also included the breakdown of qualifiers from the 2008 NCAA Tournament.

1989 NCAA Qualifiers – Division I

                                                Qualifiers            Wild Cards

Big Ten                                 30                           17

Eastern League                    30                           13

Big Eight                               30                           11

PAC Ten                               20                           16

E.I.W.A                                 20                           11

Atlantic Coast                      10                           18

West Regional                     10                           11

Big Sky/WAC                        10                           9

East Regional                       10                           6

Mid-American                      10                           6

East Coast                           10                           1

New England                       10                           1

Southern                               10

                Total                      330

 

Division II                             10                           15

Division III                           10                           0

                Total                      35

 

2008 NCAA Qualifiers – Division I

 

Atlantic Coast                    14

Big Ten                               72

Big 12                                 38

CAA                                     24

East Regional                     11

E.I.W.A                                47

EWL                                    32

Mid-American                   19

Pac Ten                             38

Southern                           15

West Regional                 20

                Total                 330

 

Another look into the past comes with the All-Time College Wrestling Team from 1928-1988 which are listed below.

 

All-Time College Wrestling Team (1928-1988)

118 – Gray Simons  (Lock Haven State)

126 – Yojiro Uetake (Oklahoma State)

134 – Dan Gable (Iowa State)

142 – Buddy Arndt (Oklahoma State)

150 – Bill Koll (Iowa State Teachers College)

158 – Stanley Henson (Oklahoma State) and Lee Kemp (Wisconsin)

167 – Jack Van Bebber (Oklahoma State)

177 – Dan Hodge (Oklahoma)

190 – Verne Gagne (Minnesota)

Heavyweight (under 250 pounds) – Jess Lewis (Oregon State)

Heavyweight (over 250 pounds) – Chris Taylor (Iowa State)

 

Now let’s get back to 2008 and talk about wrestling season. November 1st, marks the first official day of competition for the 2008-09 wrestling season.  There will be a number of opens and even a few dual meets this weekend taking place across the country.  To get a look at what is going on check out the sortable college schedule to see where your favorite team will be this weekend.  Also don’t forget to check out www.intermatwrestle.com for individual and team results as the season progresses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Fighting Scots of Edinboro: The Book

Since 2001 when Josh Koscheck took his place on the top of the medal stand at Carver Hawkeye Arena and was crowned the National Champion at 174 pounds, people knew that the tiny school of Edinboro home of the Fighting Scot Wrestling Team had truly made a name for its self in Division I Wrestling.  Just twelve years earlier in 1989, they had crowned their first Division I National Champion Sean O’Day, only a few years after they had made the jump to Division I. There are now three Fighting Scots that hold the title of National Champion after Gregor Gillespie joined O’Day and Koscheck in 2006.

Edinboro is a Division II institution ranging in size from 7,000 – 8,000 students, located only thirteen miles from Lake Erie and directly in the snow belt of northwestern Pennsylvania.  It is a relatively small school, compared to many of the schools that the wrestlers compete against during the season.  They have risen to the top all because of an Athletic Director (Jim McDonald) that could not stand to lose.

It was January 25, 1984, and Edinboro University had just been handed a hefty loss by the Golden Eagles of Clarion. They lost every weight that night and to add insult to injury Clarion was not apparently challenged enough during the dual meet, that they held practice in Edinboro’s wrestling room before they got on the bus to head home.

The programs rise to a competitive Division I Wrestling Program is chronicled in a new book by John Dudley, “The Fighting Scots of Edinboro: One Small School’s Rise to Prominence Among College Wrestling’s Heavyweights.”

In a recent interview with the author, he gave his thoughts and inspiration as to how the book came about and what it means to him:

I started with an idea about two and a half years ago originally I was going to do it as a magazine story. I was not thinking about a book at the time. I had always heard the stories about the blowout loss to Clarion in 1984 that kind of sparked Jim McDonald  that it was time to stop getting his butt kicked by other PSAC wrestling schools.

I went back and I met with Jim McDonald and met with other people that were around at the time. It struck me that there was probably more than a magazine story.  At the same time Bruce had gotten an inquiry letter from this publishing company in St. Louis, Reedy Press. They do a lot of co-publishing with schools. “If you ever have needs for institutional publishing let us know.” So this went to a straight book deal, they liked the idea from the start.

There was a guy there that went to Iowa knew wrestling, knew (Dan) Gable and knew a little about Division I wrestling. He understood how unique the situation was with Edinboro as a tiny public school against Big 10 and Big 12 powers, how unique that whole story was. He was sold on it from the start.  He sold it to his publisher group and 2 years later I have a book.

What was important to me from the start is we knew it had to be a narrative history, it could not be told in a linear this is what happened here and here. It became clear to me early in the project that the personalities had to carry the book, even though the book is loosely started in the early 1980’s,  it focuses on those people that made the program what it was: Jim McDonald, Mike DeAnna, Bruce Baumgartner, Mike Hahesy, Sean O’Day,  Tim Flynn, Tony  Robie,  Jason Robison, Lou Rosselli, Josh Koscheck, and Gregor Gillespie in my opinion that shaped the program and made it what it is today.

The book can be purchased online through Amazon.com or by follow this direct link.

Dudley is a columnist and sports reporter for the Erie Times-News, he has been covering high school and college wrestling since 1999.