Missouri's Jaydin Eierman defeated UNI's Josh Alber 12-6 in last year's dual (Photo/Mark Lundy, Lutte-Lens.com)If there's such a thing, last week almost had too many ranked duals to keep up with. It turned out to be nine duals in total that saw ranked teams clash. This weekend is a little different, but will still feature five matches that pit ranked team against each other, and the actions begins Thursday night with a top-20 dual.
Note: All times Eastern Time (ET).
Thursday
No. 16 Northern Iowa at No. 6 Missouri (8 p.m.)
Coach Doug Schwab and the Northern Iowa Panthers travel to Columbia (Mo.) with hopes of handing the undefeated Missouri Tigers their first loss of the season. Coach Brian Smith's team is 6-0 this season and has won 31 straight dual meets, while the Panthers are 2-3 in dual action this season.
There will be back-to-back top-20 matchups in this dual. They'll be at 141 pounds and 149 pounds.
At 141 pounds, Missouri's two-time NCAA All-American and third-ranked Jaydin Eierman (Missouri) will wrestle Northern Iowa's eighth-ranked Josh Alber (Northern Iowa) for the third time in college. Eierman stuck Alber in their first meeting and scored a 12-6 victory over the Panther in last year's dual.
Eierman, who was on a 10-match win streak, is looking to rebound after suffering a 3-1 loss to returning NCAA champion Yianni Diakomihalis of Cornell. Alber, on the other hand, brings an eight-match win streak into Columbia.
At 149 pounds, Northern Iowa's ninth-ranked Max Thomsen will take on No. 13 Brock Mauller.
Thomsen, a fifth-place finisher at the NCAA Championships two seasons ago, is 13-4 on the season, with two of those losses coming in his last five matches.
Mauller is 20-1 this season and has rallied off 13 straight wins after dropping his match against Iowa State's Jarrett Degen at the Lindenwood Open.
Friday
No. 7 Minnesota at No. 17 Illinois (7 p.m.)
The seventh-ranked Gophers head to Urbana-Champaign to wrestle the No. 17 Illinois Fighting Illini.
Both of these teams are looking to bounce back after dropping their last dual. The Gophers lost to the fourth-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes, and the Illini lost to the fifth-ranked Michigan Wolverines.
The first four weights of the dual will peg ranked opponents against each other, but the matchup to watch comes at 141 where Illinois' fourth-ranked Mike Carr will wrestle seventh-ranked Mitchell McKee.
Carr, the Big Ten runner-up last year, returned to the Illini lineup last weekend and went 2-0 after sitting out over a month to rehab an ankle injury that he suffered at the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational. Carr is 6-2 on the season, with both of his losses coming to Missouri's third-ranked Jaydin Eierman.
His opponent, McKee, is 10-1 on the season and has won his last four matches, including scoring a 5-3 decision over Iowa's No. 15 Max Murin in last weekend's dual. McKee's only loss this year was to North Carolina's A.C. Headlee.
Other ranked matchups:
125: No. 6 Sean Russell (Minnesota) vs. Travis Piotrowski (Illinois)
133: No. 9 Ethan Lizak (Minnesota) vs. No. 17 Dylan Duncan (Illinois)
149: No. 7 Steve Bleise Minnesota vs. No. 13 Eric Barone (Illinois)
No. 14 Rutgers at No. 4 Iowa (9 p.m.)
Coach Scott Goodale brings his No. 14 Scarlet Knights to Iowa City to take on the undefeated fourth-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes.
Rutgers is 7-3 this season and fell to second-ranked Oklahoma State after upsetting coach Chris Bono's No. 11 Wisconsin Badgers.
This weekend's dual at Carver-Hawkeye will feature three top-20 matches, but all eyes will be on the 133-pound match where Rutgers' third-ranked returning NCAA runner-up Nick Suriano will wrestle Iowa's eighth-ranked Austin DeSanto.
Both of these wrestlers dominated the headlines last weekend, and for all the wrong reasons.
Suriano was in the headlines for his sudden victory loss to Oklahoma State's second-ranked Daton Fix. Suriano was hit with a hands-to-the-face call in sudden victory and fell for only the second time in his career, bringing his career record to 39-2.
DeSanto, who dominated the headlines at last year's NCAA Championships for hitting a kimura on Michigan's eventual NCAA runner-up Stevan Micic, again dominated headlines after shoving Minnesota's ninth-ranked Ethan Lizak's face into the mat as time expired.
This will be the first time they've met.
Other ranked matches:
157: No. 14 John Van Brill (Rutgers) vs. No. 5 Kaleb Young (Iowa)
184: No. 17 Nick Gravina (Rutgers) vs. No. 13 Cash Wilcke (Iowa)
Saturday
No. 2 Oklahoma State at No. 15 Pittsburgh (1 p.m.)
Coach John Smith leads his second-ranked Cowboys into Pittsburgh for arguably the best dual in the country when his undefeated Cowboys take on the undefeated Pitt Panthers. The Cowboys are 6-0, and the Panthers are 8-0.
For the second week in a row, Cowboy freshman Daton Fix will wrestle a top-five opponent. Fix, who is ranked second in the nation, brings an undefeated 19-0 record into Pittsburgh after defeating Rutgers' third-ranked Nick Suriano in overtime last weekend.
Fix is set to take on Pittsburgh's fourth-ranked Micky Phillippi. Phillippi is 12-1 this season, with his only loss coming to the man that Fix just beat, Nick Suriano. The Panther lost that match to Suriano, 11-3.
Other ranked matchups:
157: No. 19 Andrew Shomers (Oklahoma State) vs. No. 10 Taleb Rahmani (Pittsburgh)
184: No. 11 Jacobe Smith (Oklahoma State) vs. No. 12 Nino Bonaccorsi (Pittsburgh)
285: No. 2 Derek White (Oklahoma State) vs. No. 13 Demetrius Thomas (Pittsburgh)
Sunday
No. 12 Nebraska at No. 1 Penn State (1 p.m.)
Coach Mark Manning and the and No. 12 Nebraska head to Happy Valley to wrestle coach Cael Sanderson's defending NCAA champions and top-ranked Penn State Nittany Lions.
This is the sixth time the Huskers have faced a ranked opponent this season. They're 4-2 against top-25 opponents, with the pair of losses coming to No. 9 NC State and No. 11 Wisconsin.
Seven of the duals 10 bouts will see top-20 wrestlers clash, including four matches where each wrestler sits inside the top 10.
The match to be most excited about comes at 157 pounds where two-time NCAA champion and top-ranked Jason Nolf will wrestle two-time All-American and second-ranked Tyler Berger.
Nolf is 15-0 this season and has scored bonus points in every match that he's wrestled. He has nine falls, four major decisions, and two technical falls.
Last weekend, Nolf scored a 19-7 major decision over Northwestern's third-ranked Ryan Deakin.
Berger is 15-1 on the season, with his only loss coming to Purdue's No. 12 Griffin Parriott.
In addition to Jason Nolf, Penn State could potentially send out three other top-ranked wrestlers to face a ranked Nebraska opponent. The other three top-ranked Nittany Lions are Vincenzo Joseph (165), Mark Hall (174) and Bo Nickal (197).
Joseph, the reigning two-time NCAA champion who is undefeated on the season, sat out last weekend's dual against Wisconsin's third-ranked Evan Wick. It is not clear if he'll be back for this dual, but if he is, he'll take on sixth-ranked Isaiah White, who is 10-3 this year.
Joseph scored an overtime takedown to win the pairs only other matchup, which came at last year's NCAA Championships.
At 174 pounds, top-ranked Mark Hall, an NCAA champion from two seasons ago, will take on ninth-ranked Mikey Labriola, while No. 1 Bo Nickal will wrestle No. 11 Eric Schultz at 197.
Other ranked matchups:
141: No. 19 Chad Red (Nebraska) vs. No. 6 Nick Lee (Penn State)
184: No. 5 Taylor Venz (Nebraska) vs. No. 3 Shakur Rasheed (Penn State)
285: No. 14 David Jensen (Nebraska) vs. No. 4 Anthony Cassar (Penn State)
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