NCAA Dual Team Championship

[JimmyCinnabon]

On 1/16/2024 at 2:03 PM, ionel said:

Figuring out top 16 is pretty easy and just need to be sure it includes the top 4.  The problem is when the top team refuses to wrestle.  

What is the problem if the top team refuses to wrestle? Just hold it without them. The winner is dual champ. If they want to be dual champs they can wrestle in the dual championship. If they don't want to be dual champs then who cares?

[JimmyCinnabon]

On 1/16/2024 at 2:28 PM, forkemaz said:

Oh no I'm not proof reading my posts on a wrestling forum and I've been roasted by a close minded man with sass of a middle school girl. Please someone help! Or... it's duel.

This is the hill you want to die on? Come on, man. There are far better hills to choose.

[Dogbone]

42 minutes ago, JimmyCinnabon said:

What is the problem if the top team refuses to wrestle? Just hold it without them. The winner is dual champ. If they want to be dual champs they can wrestle in the dual championship. If they don't want to be dual champs then who cares?

The top teams bring legitimacy to the event.  if the top 2 teams don't attend,  the champs can call themselves whatever they want, it will be held in the same regard as the Navy Classic, MSU Open, Black Knight Open champs. 

[Gene Mills Fan]

Great for the fans no matter what!!!  but the winner is the Dual Invitational Team Champion or Cowboy Shootout Team Champion. Not our National Dual Team Champion;   freshman and RS freshman and weight cuts really determine final team rosters.

  

[JimmyCinnabon]

2 hours ago, Dogbone said:

The top teams bring legitimacy to the event.  if the top 2 teams don't attend,  the champs can call themselves whatever they want, it will be held in the same regard as the Navy Classic, MSU Open, Black Knight Open champs. 

 

None of those are labeled the National Dual Championships though. If the top team or two top teams don't attend then everyone can call them stupid buttfaces and maybe the next year they will. And if they don't people can just call them stupid buttfaces again. I don't see any downside of this.

[alex1fly]

2 hours ago, JimmyCinnabon said:

 

None of those are labeled the National Dual Championships though. If the top team or two top teams don't attend then everyone can call them stupid buttfaces and maybe the next year they will. And if they don't people can just call them stupid buttfaces again. I don't see any downside of this.

Love this.

Maybe we can also just grant PSU the title in March. 10 individual champions, their guys don't have to wrestle a single match all season. Cael will be appeased and then the rest of D1 can battle it out.

[fishbane]

6 hours ago, JimmyCinnabon said:

What is the problem if the top team refuses to wrestle? Just hold it without them. The winner is dual champ. If they want to be dual champs they can wrestle in the dual championship. If they don't want to be dual champs then who cares?

They held the Olympics without the top team this year.  It worked okay.  The thing is that the Olympics is a big event and has been or years.  Can this get started or perhaps restart? without the top team?

If I recall correctly the thing that sunk the national duals was back in 2011 when Iowa didn't participate.  The tournament had bounced around the country, but had been at UNI for 5-6 straight years and wasn't losing money there.  Then Iowa didn't attend and I'm sure it lost money.  PSU didn't attend either, but Iowa was probably the bigger absence at the time. A series of format changes ensued and the tournament struggled to either break even or attract the top teams.  The prize money might attract more top teams, but maybe not PSU.  PSU's absence and the  timing in November might struggle to grab fans attention.  Those things and offering  $1M in prize money might make it difficult to sustain.

[fishbane]

On 1/15/2025 at 3:20 PM, 666 said:

Not really a good counterpoint by Goodale.  We had national duals for years and no such point was made. 

I disagree.  Having a National Duals in November makes no sense as Goodale points out.  At least not with the current schedule.  If this tournament in Tulsa is happening the middle of November how can you even pick the teams to invite?  What is that based on?  The first competition of the year was Oct. 31st this year.  Presumable teams need some notice to make plans and set their schedule.  

Ideally a national dual meet championship would be the culmination of the season and the final dual of the year.  Each team would have a chance to qualify assuming they win all their duals.  By January you have some idea of where teams sit and who to invite.  An up and coming team would have a chance to do something to get invited.  If you are inviting teams in early November then you can't be basing that on any relevant results at all.

[CHROMEBIRD]

7 hours ago, JimmyCinnabon said:

What is the problem if the top team refuses to wrestle? Just hold it without them. The winner is dual champ. If they want to be dual champs they can wrestle in the dual championship. If they don't want to be dual champs then who cares?

Because most people would want a dual championship to matter? Until now, dual championships haven't had much success because wrestlers are far more focused on seed protection and peaking for Nationals. If we want duals to really matter, the sport would either need to get rid of the individual championship tournament or incentivize wrestlers & teams to fully participate in duals and a dual championship and not just NCAAs.

Edited Wednesday at 09:20 PM by CHROMEBIRD

[BruceyB]

31 minutes ago, fishbane said:

I disagree.  Having a National Duals in November makes no sense as Goodale points out.  At least not with the current schedule.  If this tournament in Tulsa is happening the middle of November how can you even pick the teams to invite?  What is that based on?  The first competition of the year was Oct. 31st this year.  Presumable teams need some notice to make plans and set their schedule.  

Ideally a national dual meet championship would be the culmination of the season and the final dual of the year.  Each team would have a chance to qualify assuming they win all their duals.  By January you have some idea of where teams sit and who to invite.  An up and coming team would have a chance to do something to get invited.  If you are inviting teams in early November then you can't be basing that on any relevant results at all.

Flo released an interview with Tom Brands today and was asked about his thoughts on the National Duals. He said it was a very exciting announcement, and that it's a kind of event that would interest Iowa wrestling.  He sounded like he had some vague reservations about the format moving forward. But I got the impression that Iowa will likely be a participant.

Here is the interview. National Duals talk starts right at the 6:00 mark.

https://www.flowrestling.org/video/13549132-tom-brands-wants-to-put-his-best-team-on-the-mat-heading-into-ohio-state-dual

[forkemaz]

8 hours ago, JimmyCinnabon said:

This is the hill you want to die on? Come on, man. There are far better hills to choose.

Why would i die? Are you challenging me to a DUEL?

[Wrestleknownothing]

1 hour ago, fishbane said:

I disagree.  Having a National Duals in November makes no sense as Goodale points out.  At least not with the current schedule.  If this tournament in Tulsa is happening the middle of November how can you even pick the teams to invite?  What is that based on?  The first competition of the year was Oct. 31st this year.  Presumable teams need some notice to make plans and set their schedule.  

Ideally a national dual meet championship would be the culmination of the season and the final dual of the year.  Each team would have a chance to qualify assuming they win all their duals.  By January you have some idea of where teams sit and who to invite.  An up and coming team would have a chance to do something to get invited.  If you are inviting teams in early November then you can't be basing that on any relevant results at all.

I like the idea of national duals (even though I do not think it constitutes a better definition of best team), but November is a problem if you want to claim this as any form of championship. Championships happen at the end of the season. Anything at the start of the season would be illegitimate in most fans, and certainly all casual fans, opinions.

Imagine having the college football playoffs and then having the regular season.

[BruceyB]

7 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

I like the idea of national duals (even though I do not think it constitutes a better definition of best team), but November is a problem if you want to claim this as any form of championship. Championships happen at the end of the season. Anything at the start of the season would be illegitimate in most fans, and certainly all casual fans, opinions.

Imagine having the college football playoffs and then having the regular season.

I think the conversation in this thread is being muddied up by using the term National Duals to describe both the current event, and the theoretical event that the thread originally proposed. The National Duals Invitational, is not the same as a National Dual Championship. National Duals is nothing more than cool event where we'll be treated to a lot of high-level duals and matchups that we otherwise wouldn't see until late in the season. Championship is not even in the name.

[Pin Head]

Right now the Big Ten has 7 of the top 16 ranked dual meet teams. Do you think the likes of Iowa & Penn State want to face off four times a year?  (National dual, conference dual, conference tournament and nationals. ) There would have to be some elimination of conference duals or use conference duals as a qualifier. I think a dual meet champion would be great but the logistics and team preferences just aren't there.

[Pinnacle]

10 hours ago, Gene Mills Fan said:

Great for the fans no matter what!!!  but the winner is the Dual Invitational Team Champion or Cowboy Shootout Team Champion. Not our National Dual Team Champion;   freshman and RS freshman and weight cuts really determine final team rosters.

  

 

Paycom Dual Champs. 

[JimmyCinnabon]

14 hours ago, forkemaz said:

Why would i die? Are you challenging me to a DUEL?

Well played, sir. Well played. 

[1032004]

23 hours ago, Jason Bryant said:

Tennis is in the midst of a pilot program with split seasons. They do individual tournaments and qualifying for the individual championships in the fall. All team duals are in the spring. Individual titles determined in one half, team champs in another.

https://wearecollegetennis.com/2023/09/01/ncaa-division-i-individual-championships/

Interesting.  If I’m not mistaken, haven’t they also been having both an individual and team tournament for awhile?

[1032004]

16 hours ago, fishbane said:

I disagree.  Having a National Duals in November makes no sense as Goodale points out.  At least not with the current schedule.  If this tournament in Tulsa is happening the middle of November how can you even pick the teams to invite?  What is that based on?  The first competition of the year was Oct. 31st this year.  Presumable teams need some notice to make plans and set their schedule.  

Ideally a national dual meet championship would be the culmination of the season and the final dual of the year.  Each team would have a chance to qualify assuming they win all their duals.  By January you have some idea of where teams sit and who to invite.  An up and coming team would have a chance to do something to get invited.  If you are inviting teams in early November then you can't be basing that on any relevant results at all.

As @BruceyB said, I think the conversation is being conflated between the recently announced event in Oklahoma and a legitimate dual championship.

Of course a legitimate championship would need to be the end of the season.  But it seems there’s a general consensus that that isn’t likely, so this is the next best thing (and who knows, if it’s successful maybe one day it could lead to an actual championship).  So doing this far apart from NCAA’s makes sense so that the focus for wrestlers and teams will still be on NCAA’s

[666]

I don't see what the problem is with national duals and PSU not participating. If they did participate they'd win easily, so it seems like a great opportunity for another team win a national title, albeit in duals. 

[fishbane]

22 minutes ago, 1032004 said:

As @BruceyB said, I think the conversation is being conflated between the recently announced event in Oklahoma and a legitimate dual championship.

Of course a legitimate championship would need to be the end of the season.  But it seems there’s a general consensus that that isn’t likely, so this is the next best thing (and who knows, if it’s successful maybe one day it could lead to an actual championship).  So doing this far apart from NCAA’s makes sense so that the focus for wrestlers and teams will still be on NCAA’s

Yes the tournament later this year in Tulsa is way too early.  On the Basch and the Brain podcast last week they discussed how to make national duals work ahead of the announcement.  Willie seemed to think that the split season like the tennis pilot program is the answer.  Wrestle a dual season in the first half of the year oct-dec and have national duals in Dec.  Then move all the opens, invitationals and various individual tournaments to January and February and keep the individual post season unchanged in March.

I don't think this is the answer.  It's a pretty radical schedule adjustment and I think it would change the flow of the season too much.  Everything kind of builds to March currently.  There are a lot of big duals later in the year which leads into conferences and then NCAAs.  Teams just don't wrestle tournaments in the second semester.  I think this would create a lull in the schedule where the top teams pretty much sit their starters until the post season. 

Getting teams to wrestle tournaments after CKLV would be trying to convince OSU, ISU, ASU, Missouri, PSU, Michigan, Illinois, Lehigh, Cornell, VT, ect to change what they did this year.  Sanderson at PSU was the only consistent hold out of the old formats. From a fan perspective this should happen mid to late February at the end of the season before conferences.  If that can't happen then my choice would be to have it two weeks after NCAAs with the top 4 or 8 teams in the NCAA standings qualifying or eliminate the conference tournaments and have it two weeks before NCAAs. 

[666]

2 minutes ago, fishbane said:

Yes the tournament later this year in Tulsa is way too early.  On the Basch and the Brain podcast last week they discussed how to make national duals work ahead of the announcement.  Willie seemed to think that the split season like the tennis pilot program is the answer.  Wrestle a dual season in the first half of the year oct-dec and have national duals in Dec.  Then move all the opens, invitationals and various individual tournaments to January and February and keep the individual post season unchanged in March.

I don't think this is the answer.  It's a pretty radical schedule adjustment and I think it would change the flow of the season too much.  Everything kind of builds to March currently.  There are a lot of big duals later in the year which leads into conferences and then NCAAs.  Teams just don't wrestle tournaments in the second semester.  I think this would create a lull in the schedule where the top teams pretty much sit their starters until the post season. 

Getting teams to wrestle tournaments after CKLV would be trying to convince OSU, ISU, ASU, Missouri, PSU, Michigan, Illinois, Lehigh, Cornell, VT, ect to change what they did this year.  Sanderson at PSU was the only consistent hold out of the old formats. From a fan perspective this should happen mid to late February at the end of the season before conferences.  If that can't happen then my choice would be to have it two weeks after NCAAs with the top 4 or 8 teams in the NCAA standings qualifying or eliminate the conference tournaments and have it two weeks before NCAAs. 

That'd never fly. The conference tournaments in themselves are more popular than national duals. I guarantee if you asked 100 hardcore college wrestling fans if they want to get rid of the B1G conference tournament to institute a "national dual meet" that 95% of them would laugh in your face. 

How about having national duals early in the season? Invite the top 8 or 16 teams per the dual rankings and have at it PRIOR to CKLV.  If PSU doesn't want to participate, fine, scratch them and invite #17, and so on. 

[fishbane]

13 minutes ago, 666 said:

That'd never fly. The conference tournaments in themselves are more popular than national duals. I guarantee if you asked 100 hardcore college wrestling fans if they want to get rid of the B1G conference tournament to institute a "national dual meet" that 95% of them would laugh in your face. 

Perhaps, but with at large bids and the increasing number of forfeits not only in the consolations but also the finals they may not be laughing a few years from now.  Fans would only really miss one tournament.  The rest are lightly attended and likely lose money.  The Big Ten is the only conference that really needs a tournament.  The Big 12 and ACC are small enough that they wrestle all the other teams already.  An end of season tournament is superfluous as all these matches should have happened already.  Back when the Big 12 only had 5 teams they would wrestle home and away duals to make a conference dual schedule with 8 duals.  Why even have an individual tournament?  Everyone should have wrestled everyone else 2x already - just use those results to pick the national qualifiers.

To round out this proposal teams would wrestle a round robin of conference duals and wrestlers would qualify to NCAAs based on individual standings for each weight from the record in conference duals and an allocation to each conference.  At large selections would be made.  Participation in a min number of conference duals at the weight would be required. Since regular season duals would be in effect the NCAA qualifier this would incentive wrestlers to wrestle in duals so big matchups would be more likely to actually happen.

[Dogbone]

1 hour ago, 666 said:

That'd never fly. The conference tournaments in themselves are more popular than national duals. I guarantee if you asked 100 hardcore college wrestling fans if they want to get rid of the B1G conference tournament to institute a "national dual meet" that 95% of them would laugh in your face. 

How about having national duals early in the season? Invite the top 8 or 16 teams per the dual rankings and have at it PRIOR to CKLV.  If PSU doesn't want to participate, fine, scratch them and invite #17, and so on. 

I am not so sure.  I have attended 2 B1Gs tournaments and I am not sure I will ever go back.  It is really a qualifier and that's how teams treat it.  It's common to have forfeits in the finals, not to mention on the backside.   

I don't think a true National Duals any where close to the Individual tournament is realistic, but now that everyone's approach is the "only thing that matters is March (NCAAs)" the conference tournaments aren't as material.  

Heck, PSU has dominated college wrestling recently, but has only won 4 of the last 10 B1G tournament champions.  No one really cares.

[Gene Mills Fan]

14 minutes ago, Dogbone said:

I am not so sure.  I have attended 2 B1Gs tournaments and I am not sure I will ever go back.  It is really a qualifier and that's how teams treat it.  It's common to have forfeits in the finals, not to mention on the backside.   

I don't think a true National Duals any where close to the Individual tournament is realistic, but now that everyone's approach is the "only thing that matters is March (NCAAs)" the conference tournaments aren't as material.  

Heck, PSU has dominated college wrestling recently, but has only won 4 of the last 10 B1G tournament champions.  No one really cares.

Right it's only the second best tournament in college wrestling, and with Big ten Network has brought  national TV coverage to NCAA wrestling than anything else?

[Interviewed_at_Weehawken]

On 1/22/2025 at 9:55 AM, Dogbone said:

The top teams bring legitimacy to the event.  if the top 2 teams don't attend,  the champs can call themselves whatever they want, it will be held in the same regard as the Navy Classic, MSU Open, Black Knight Open champs. 

You've got to be amazingly good as a team to win the Black Knight Open in recent years.  Being a champ of that tournament should grant immediate legitimacy.