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Ohio State - The Ohio State University has been as consistent a presence at the top of the NCAA rankings as they come. Since winning the NCAA Team Title in 2015, they have placed 3rd, 2nd, 2nd, 2nd, Canceled, 9th, 13th, and last season they placed 4th. They’re cycling in talent, and they tend to develop and produce more than they don’t. This season they have a handful of athletes bumping up weight classes, so the lineup will look similar, but also a little different. They’ll also have a handful of quality guys fighting for their chance in the lineup. It’s a unique situation to have so much roster turnover, and yet not really be too concerned with their ability or potential. Additionally, there is the glaring and unfortunate loss of Sammy Sasso from their lineup. Perspective is key, so he’s not in the lineup, but he’s recovering and that’s what matters. Even where the weight class changes are taking place, the Buckeyes have plenty of studs to step into place. I expect this team to outperform their tournament preseason ranking of 12. An interesting note, this will read a little differently from other previews, since I’m finishing this one up moments after their Wrestle Offs on October 26th, so that’s why. Enjoy! TOP RETURNERS Jesse Mendez is a returning All-American from 133 last season, and fresh off of a World Silver Medal at U20s at 65 kgs. Initially, he registered for Senior trials at 61kgs, but his bumping up weights and down in age group makes me believe that this was the right move for him at the time. He looked solid in his wrestle-off and I expect him to fit in well at 141. Dylan D’Emilio is another one of the Buckeyes coming off of an All-American finish and bumping up a weight. He steps into the vacated spot by Sasso at 149 and should be able to get some similar production. He’s proven over the years that he will get better each season, and I don’t expect that development to stop now. Getting a full seven minutes of hard wrestling from Dylan is going to be tough for anyone to handle. Carson Kharchla wasn’t an All-American last season, but he was in the bloodround, and has a podium finish in the past. He didn’t really look like himself at the end of last season. Whether it was injury-related, weight class-related, or something entirely different, I can’t say. All I know is that he’s bumped up to 174 and I expect the results to be much better. Sometimes going up a weight is the ticket. Ethan Smith did it, Jon Reader did it, Vito Arujau and Nashon Garrett did it. Lots of times it’s better, and I expect this to be one of those times. KEY DEPARTURES Sammy Sasso will be missed this season. Not only from a production and team point standing, but from a leadership standing as well. He has been a black shirt (team leader - when someone is hitting a level of accountability that meets a standard, along with the performance element, then those contributors get this honor) with the program since he was a sophomore. We’ve already seen clips of him stopping into the room and talking to the team, so he’s being heard, but it likely won’t be the same as he’s been able to contribute as an active wrestler in the room and lineup. He qualified for an Olympic redshirt, and NCAA injury waiver, so assuming the best possible outcome, he can come back for one last run at that elusive NCAA Title. Malik Heinselman, another staple in the Buckeye lineup will be gone after finishing last season with an unfortunate injury just before B1Gs. Heinselman was a strong contributor and was consistently beating top competition and was positioned to battle for All-American honors before being hurt. Ohio State hasn’t had to worry about what they were going to do at 125 for a long time, but this year they’ll have a couple strong options for the weight. Kaleb Romero, a favorite wrestler of mine, finished off his career last season on the podium once again. He was so physical and punishing when he wrestled, and he looks like Dick Tracy. He was a guy who came in with a lot of high hopes and attention, and when it didn’t happen immediately some people kind of wrote him off. Not Kaleb though, he went back to work and developed himself into as dangerous a wrestler as it gets. It’s not easy to replace a 2x All-American, but just like 125, the Buckeyes will have some solid young options. Ethan Smith, was another 2x All-American leaving the Ohio State lineup. He and Kaleb were routinely in the hunt to be on the podium, and both bumped up weights to find the best version of themself. Ethan was named “Black Shirt” status (referenced above) on December 19th, 2019, so he’s been a leader in and outside of the wrestling room for most of his illustrious career. Thankfully for Ohio State, they’ll replace his production with a tried and true guy in Carson Kharchla. Hopefully, the move up in weight from 165 to 174 can also help Carson find his best self. At Heavyweight, Tate Orndorff had been a generally reliable option since transferring into the program for the 2020-2021 season. He was even an All-American in his first season wearing scarlet and gray. Tate provided the reliability that top-level teams need at heavyweight to compete for trophies and NCAA Championships. As good teams tend to do though, Ohio State has a game plan to not only replace this production, but likely produce more along the way. NEWCOMERS The Buckeyes are blessed to have three legitimate options at 125 to replace Heinselman. Peyton Fenton, Brendan McCrone, and Vincent Kilkeary have all shown that they have a legitimate chase of wearing the Scarlet and Gray. Kilkeary could redshirt this season, and judging by preliminary wrestle-off results (he dropped his first match to Fenton, 2-1), he would theoretically be third in that depth chart. McCrone ended up winning the wrestle-offs between the three, but that only means so much. Time will tell who they end up running with in March. Regardless, the Buckeyes are going to take advantage of the matches that they get to use for true freshmen. Ohio State plans to take their whole team to Clarion for their Open to collect some data points on their athletes. The freshmen will get chances to compete and take their spots. You can count on that. At 133 we had Nic Bouzakis, fresh off of a World Bronze medal at U20s, taking on Andre Gonzales now up at 133. Gonzales proved to be ready for the challenge as he went ahead and got a late takedown to make the match 7-6 in favor of Bouzakis. Can’t wait to see how this unfolds as the year goes on. We expected to see Bryce Hepner at 165, but it was announced during the broadcast that he had recently been injured and would not be competing during the wrestle-offs. We certainly wish him a speedy recovery. He had shown he was fully capable by beating both Carson Kharchla in the wrestle-offs last season, as well as beating Cam Amine early last season at the Cleveland State Open. He’s hard to takedown, good on top, and can really muddy up a match. Isaac Wilcox ended up winning the wrestle-off and has been a solid utility guy for the Buckeyes over the years. I expect Hepner to take this spot, but Wilcox has had B1G experience and can be a solid guy at the weight. At 184 we watched Seth Shumate take on Ryder Rogotzke. This was certainly a clash of styles, with Shumate being more controlled and technical while Rogotzke is more unconventional and unpredictable. It was a close match coming down to a takedown at the end. All of that could be for nothing though, since it was announced during the broadcast that Gavin Hoffman, All-American from 2021 at 197, is going to cut down to 184, since he feels it’s his best option to win an NCAA title. Time will tell on who gets the nod at 184, but the Buckeyes have the best kind of problem with having a series of guys at the weight who can perform well. Nick Feldman handled business in his wrestle-off. He will fit in nicely with the big, fast, and athletic heavyweights in the B1G and will be ready to compete with the best in the country right away. He looks like the redshirt season did him well. WRESTLER TO WATCH This isn’t a surprising piece, but all of the wrestlers bumping up weights, Mendez, D’Emilio, and Kharchla, are very interesting to me. Mendez with his World silver medal from U20s this summer proves that he’s ready for that weight. 65 kgs is 143 lbs, so he’ll adjust just fine. D’Amelio is a senior and his physicality and approach I would think would also transfer well. He’s shown such great development over the years that I’m sure he’ll slide in here just fine. Kharchla is undoubtedly a great talent. You don’t beat Alex Marinelli as a freshman by mistake. It looked last year at times that he was battling the weight. Maybe it was injury concerns also, but either way, I’m excited to see the version of him that can go hard for seven minutes. Those seven minutes with an energized Kharchla look like hell on earth. Paddy Gallagher was a huge recruit for the Buckeyes and got the chance to start last year as a redshirt freshman. Maybe not at the level of expectations that people hoped, but that’s not really fair. Freshmen shouldn’t be expected to come in and win NCAA titles just because it’s happened before. There are certainly exceptions to the rule, but those exceptions don’t always determine the development and progression of someone else. As long as he stays the course he can be a Kaleb Romero and follow that trajectory, if not better. He looked excellent in his wrestle-off, and left little doubt that he’s ready to hit the ground running this season. TOP OUT-OF-CONFERENCE DUAL Looking at the schedule, at first, I thought Cornell. They’re one of the top-ranked teams in the country, Bouzakis v Arujau, Kharchla v Foca, Feldman v Fernandes. Lots of great options here. However, I’ve been convinced that Virginia Tech is their top out-of-conference dual. This is their first dual of the season and has been an early season dual for the last several years. Last year, this dual was an 18-15 win for the Buckeyes, and eight of the ten matches were within two points. I’m not great at math, but these sorts of data points tell me that it was close. This year has several other wild matchups and exciting bonus point chances for each team to make this just as exciting as previous years.

What has become a preseason staple for us at InterMat, counting down the top 50 wrestlers for the upcoming season, is back for 2023-24. With a large chunk of sixth and seventh-year seniors gone, there is plenty of turnover from last year’s list to this one. That makes for a lot of fun and perhaps some spirited debates. Like last year, the third iteration of this feature will show five wrestlers at a time, counting down from #50 to #1. For each wrestler, we’ll have some basic information along with career highlights, and a brief analysis of their career (with an emphasis on last season), followed by an outlook for the upcoming season. Here are #16-20 #21-25 #26-30 #31-35 #36-40 #41-45 #46-50 15) Chris Foca (Cornell) Weight: 174 lbs Collegiate Accomplishments: 2023 NCAA 3rd Place, 2023 EIWA Champion 2022 Top-50 Ranking: Not Ranked During his first season competing for Cornell, Chris Foca showed flashes of becoming a title contender. He took the next step during the 2022-23 season and won 30 of 32 matches overall and had a third-place finish in Tulsa. After losing to Mekhi Lewis (Virginia Tech) at the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational, Foca won his next 20 contests. That streak included his first conference title and extended into the NCAA semifinals, where he fell to the eventual champion Carter Starocci (Penn State), 6-0. During two years of competition at Cornell, Foca has amassed a 54-10 record. His 2022-23 season saw his bonus point percentage increase to 50%, up from 32%. 2023-24 Outlook: A late-season injury in 2021-22 probably dampened our expectations for Foca during the last preseason. That won’t happen again. He comes into the year ranked second in the nation. Foca’s NCAA performance helped Cornell earn a trophy with a third-place finish in Tulsa. The Big Red should be in the trophy hunt again, so another high finish from Foca will be essential. This season, Foca is slated to meet three of the top-eight 174 lbers in dual competition. Some of them, along with two others, could be at the CKLV, too. There doesn’t appear to be a way that he and Starocci hit again pre-NCAA’s, but Foca should be plenty battle-tested by then. 14) Mekhi Lewis (Virginia Tech) Weight: 174 lbs Collegiate Accomplishments: 3x NCAA All-American (4,2,1), 3x ACC Champion 2022 Top-50 Ranking: #10 Virginia Tech’s first-ever NCAA champion continued to add to his storied career in Blacksburg with another ACC title and a high finish at the 2023 NCAA Championships. For the second straight year, Lewis went through the regular season with a single loss on his record (both coming in sudden victory), which gave him a top-three seed at the NCAA Tournament in both years. Though limited due to injuries, Lewis finished fourth with both of his losses coming in tiebreakers. With 84 career wins (against only nine losses), the 100-win plateau is certainly within reach during Lewis’ final campaign. The Hokies tend to wrestle an ambitious schedule and that was evident in 2022-23, as Lewis earned wins over three of the seven eventual All-Americans at his weight, before the postseason started. It may look strange to see Lewis directly above the wrestler who defeated him in the NCAA third-place match, but he did defeat Foca earlier in the season, is 2-1 career against him, and has a longer resume. 2023-24 Outlook: Should Lewis earn All-American honors in 2024, he would become the first Virginia Tech wrestler to get on the NCAA podium four times (David McFadden’s final All-American honor came from the NWCA in the Covid-shortened 2020 season). Some may overlook Lewis now because of a fourth-place finish in 2023; however, a year earlier he pushed Carter Starocci to the brink in the 2022 NCAA finals. Lewis’s final season coincides with what could be Virginia Tech’s best team. The Hokies have half of their lineup ranked in the top six at their respective weights. Lewis has a very strong schedule in front of him for the 2023-24 season with prospective duals against four past All-Americans, plus the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational and the Keystone Classic. 13) Levi Haines (Penn State) Weight: 157 lbs Collegiate Accomplishments: 2023 NCAA Runner-Up; 2023 Big Ten Champion 2022 Top-50 Ranking: Not Ranked Most of the first half of Levi Haines’ freshman season was filled with “will he or won’t he” questions surrounding his redshirt status. Because of redshirt rules for true freshmen enforced for the first time, Haines was able to give fans a taste of his talents when he pinned NCAA qualifier Corbyn Munson (Central Michigan) and handily defeated Jason Kraisser (Iowa State) at the Collegiate Duals. While still under redshirt, Haines took it a step further and upset returning All-American Will Lewan (Michigan) in dual action. After getting his shirt pulled, Haines finished the Big Ten dual season undefeated and was perfect overall in duals. At his first Big Ten tournament, Haines handed All-American Peyton Robb (Nebraska) his first loss of the year in the championship finals. Haines’ streak came to an end in the NCAA finals by two-time champ Austin O’Connor (North Carolina), so he finished his first season in State College as a national runner-up. 2023-24 Outlook: Haines starts the season ranked number one in the nation at 157 lbs. Since he didn’t redshirt last year and Penn State has plenty of talented options in the 157/165 lb range, there’s a chance that Haines ends up sitting. Without O’Connor in the picture, Haines is one of the favorites. That being said, there will be plenty of strong contenders challenging him. Four other 157 lb All-Americans return plus two AA’s moving up from 149 and another past All-American that was injured in 2022-23. Haines will get a look at one of them as he’s been selected to wrestle in the NWCA All-Star match against two-time All-American Jacori Teemer. Haines was good enough to make the NCAA finals as a true freshman, but it’ll be interesting to see just how much he improves during his first full offseason with Penn State. 12) Sammy Sasso (Ohio State) Weight: 149/157 Collegiate Accomplishments: 3x NCAA All-American (2,5,2), 2x Big Ten Champion 2022 Top-50 Ranking: #29 When we compiled this list Sammy Sasso was gearing up for his final season at Ohio State and expected to be a top contender at 157 lbs in search of an elusive national title. Things changed in mid-August when he was shot during a carjacking. It’s unclear if he’ll ever be able to wrestle again, but no one is counting out Sasso. During his career at Ohio State, Sasso compiled a 95-11 record with a pair of Big Ten titles and 22 falls. He made the Big Ten finals in each of his four years wrestling in the tournament. In addition to his on-mat accolades, Sasso was named a captain very early into his tenure in Columbus and was the heart and soul of a Buckeye team that earned an NCAA team trophy in 2023, finishing fourth. 11) Wyatt Hendrickson (Air Force) Weight: 285 lbs Collegiate Accomplishments: 2023 NCAA 3rd Place, 2x Big 12 Champion 2022 Top-50 Ranking: Not Ranked 2023 saw Wyatt Hendrickson become the first Air Force wrestler in 20 years to earn All-American honors. Hendrickson didn’t “just” get on the podium, he was one of the most dominant wrestlers in the nation by any metric used. Somehow, Hendrickson managed to raise his bonus point percentage from 82% in 2021-22 to almost 85% last season. That total was bolstered by an incredible 17 falls. His last two were two of his most impressive coming against Lucas Davison (Northwestern/Michigan) and Tony Cassioppi (Iowa) in the NCAA consolation semifinals and third-place bout, respectively. During his three years of competition for the Air Force Academy, Hendrickson has racked up a 73-9 record with a pair of Big 12 titles. 2023-24 Outlook: Hendrickson starts the year ranked second in the nation at 285 lbs. He’s supposed to get a shot at the only wrestler ranked above him and one of only two opponents to defeat him when he takes on Greg Kerkvliet at the NWCA All-Star Classic in mid-November. Hopefully, Hendrickson is not limited. Earlier this week, he captured a U23 world championship, but appeared to injure his knee late in the first period. During his world title run, Hendrickson only had one of four matches that didn’t end prematurely (fall/tech). Keep an eye on Hendrickson during the early portion of the season to see if the knee is an issue. If he’s in top form he’ll be one of the key players in the 285 lb title hunt.