Fantasy College Wrestling - 2024 Season Top-20 (174 lbs)

The data has been processed, the charts have been reviewed, and the evaluations are complete. The 2024 breakdown of the Top Fantasy Wrestlers of the 2024 season is here to help you start your 2025 season research.  

Just like in the past few years, some names are going to be expected, while a lot more may not be. That's the beauty of Fantasy Wrestling, where any wrestler can be the star of the weekend and win the dual for you.

To compile these lists, we used standard WrestleStat Fantasy College Wrestling Data & Scoring. Just a reminder of how points were tallied in WrestleStat leagues:

1) The scoring used was standard team scoring across all competitions (+3 for a win by decision, -4 for a loss by major, etc)

2) Scoring only counted against D1 competition

3) Wins via forfeits (FFT) would count as +6 towards a wrestler's point total

4) Wins or losses by medical forfeit (MFF) did not count as + or - towards a wrestler's point total

5) Points were only accumulated during the regular season
 

174 Top-20

Notes:

The first of three weight classes that doesn't have a Big Ten wrestler in the Top-5 and only two in the Top-10 in Fpts. 

Little Rock’s Tyler Brennan put together a career year with a best in wins (19), losses (three), and a bonus rate of almost 50%, almost doubling his wins and bonus rate from any previous season. Helping power his way to the top spot was his ten pins and one FFT dual win and surprisingly did not have a win by major or tech in 2024. Pins and decisions only. Unfortunately for Brennan, he’s the only #1 Fantasy Wrestler of a weight to not qualify for the NCAA Tournament.

Phil Conigliaro started the 2024 season with Midlands, which is where he had his only regular season loss (loss by major to Edmund Ruth). He comes in at the #2 spot, only five points out of first which is either two matches or a win over Ruth at Midlands. 

Only one point behind Conigliaro, but wrestling 12 more matches was Noah Fox of Franklin & Marshall. In wrestling his 31 countable D1 matches during the regular season, he lost seven times for a total of -24 Fpts. Despite this, he ends up at #3 on the 174 Top-20, but fell short of the NCAA tournament.

The highest ranked AA to make the list was Cade DeVos at #5, which turns out to be the lowest rank for an All-American across all ten Top-20 lists. DeVos fell four points behind Penn’s Nick Incontrera.

Edmond Ruth slots right in behind DeVos at the #6 spot. While having only one less match than DeVos, the difference seems to be in the type of win that explains the seven-point difference. DeVos had five countable techs in the 2024 regular season, compared to Ruth’s one.

In the past four seasons, Ben Pasuik has worked his way up the Fantasy Rankings. IN 2021, the COVID season, he was #16 with a whopping 19 Fpts, then in 2022 improved to #13 at 174 with 47 Fpts. He broke into the Top-10 at #9 with 61 Fpts in 2023, and finally ended his career in 2024 at #7 with 57 Fpts.

Your 174 NCAA Champ only wrestled in 11 regular season matches, but comes in at #8 with an amazing PPM of 5.0., and the only reason it wasnt higher is because of his win by decision against Rocco Welsh and being “held” to a major by Patrick Kennedy. 

Tying with 52 Fpts was Mekhi Lewis and Rocco Welsh, though Lewis had the better PPM (4 compared to Welsh’s 2.5) to take the #11 spot. 

Despite being injured and not finishing the season, Carson Kharchla put in just enough in his 16 matches to finish at #16, beating out Justin McCoy and Alex Cramer with a better PPM.

Rounding out the Top-20 is Buffalo’s only wrestler to make a Top-20 in the 2024 season, Marcus Petite. 

Who Missed The Cut:

Two All-Americans missed the Top-20 at 174 in Shane Griffith (MICH) and Lennox Wolak (COL). 

Griffith had a shortened season, only wrestling in 14 regular season matches, and fell under the #20 rank for the first time in four years with 40 Fpts. Wolak also had a shortened season, wrestling only 15 countable matches and amassing 30 Fpts.

Caleb Campos (AMER) was the first man out, being only one Fpt shy of taking the #20 spot.

Patrick Kennedy (IOWA) finishes at the #29 spot with 36 Fpts, beating out Jackson Turley (RUT) by one Fpt. Turley tied Jared Simma (UNI) in Fpts as well, but got the #30 spot with a better PPM (2.3 for Turley compared to Simma’s 1.7).

Other notables to miss the cut include Max Maylor (WISC) with 35 Fpts, Peyton Mocco (MIZZ) and Adam Kemp (CP) each with 34 Fpts, and Tyler Eischens (UNC) with 13 Fpts.