ILLINIWrestlingBlog

My podcast partner Brian Swaw will be calling the dual on BTN+ tomorrow. He was a wrestler, wrestling coach and is a wrestling father. He knows his stuff, and did a broadcast stint on ESPN radio. Plus, he's had a college student working with him as the play-by-play guy for two years running. Brian has been helping the kid out so that they make a great team now. I'd put them up against Mack Reiter at Minnesota and Jeff Byers at PSU. TOP QUALITY! I did enjoy Alex Marinelli and Kaleb Young when they called the ILLINI dual two years ago. They were pretty fair and obviously knowledgeable. The rest of the BTN+ crews have been on average very cringeworthy. If I hear another "player" or "that was a great play," I'm gonna.... On another subject, we have dueling statisticians. The first from the official ILLINOIS site, FightingILLINI.com: "The all-time series record between the Buckeyes and Illini is 37-37-1 with the first meeting dating back to 1934." The second is from the official Ohio State site: "The Buckeyes won a 37-34 edge in the all-time series against Illinois and have won seven of the last duals." That sentence has so many problems with it, I have to believe it was AI generated. I'm going with the 37-37-1, which would make this match the tiebreaker.

This is a good synopsis. I wrote up a detailed preview at the ILLINI Wrestling Blog and Forum and Beyond Plus. I also see it as a match in which each team will have five wrestlers favored to win. The Buckeyes have the two best shots at bonus (125, 141), but I also think that the ILLINI have the two best shots at upsets (174, 285). Then, there's the Kraisser wildcard. BIGGEST STORIES Two undefeated top ten teams. With a 6-3 record and coming off a 1-0 win over the #102 kid from OSU, I don't think anybody wants to see Sammy Sasso wrestle Braeden Scoles. Huge ups to Sammy for coming back, getting that 100th win, and for being a warrior and inspiration, but he's not ready yet for what Scoles brings to the table. Hepner has been out with an injury forever. I have the ILLINI favored here, and it could be bonus as well. Lucas Byrd versus the beta version of Lucas Byrd. Luuuuuke Luffman and Nick Feldman is a match that I've been waiting for and anxious to see. Luffman has been lights out this year, and all ILLINI fans are rooting for an AA. People forget how agile and quick and flexible he is. This match will go a long way to determining future seeds and rankings. Has Feldman truly recovered from injury? That'll be put to the test here. Does Ryder Rogotzke really want to go upper body with Edmond Ruth? Absolutely crucial matches up and down these lineups. Pucino has had a brilliant year, but can he keep it to a regular decision against the national champ? He couldn't at last year's dual. Little Brawlnagel can wrestle with the best in the country. (Check out his career mark versus Cam Amine). He's never faced Kharchla. Are the Huff Dogs still as delicious as they once were? I'm trying to make it back for this dual, and I'm saving room for two dogs, mustard, onions, relish and a diet coke. Sorry to those readers who're cutting weight. As for @MPhillips, I love him like a brother. Like a brother who fumbled around with his gun while our father was shot, then took sides with Moe Greene over the family, and finally, snitched us out to Hyman Roth and his um associate Johnny Ola.

We are trying to figure out which ILLINI Wrestling team was better: The 2005 ILLINI or the 2012 squad. So, on the podcast we've invited ILLINI legends Mark Jayne and Tony Dallago to duke it out. They do not disappoint. Imagine a press conference for a fight between Connor McGregor and Muhammad Ali. Yeah, like that. This is the full podcast: Here's the teaser trailer: And if you missed it, here's the first video in the 2005 vs. 2012 series featuring BRIAN GLYNN and JORDAN BLANTON and Special Guest ILLINI Head Coach MIKE POETA: Host Brian Swaw moderates and tries to keep a straight face as these ILLINI legends throw down like they just shook hands at the center of the mat and are ready to start a Big Ten dual match. Credit to the legendary Rolling Stones for their song Gimme Shelter. Additional audio credit to Kid Rock. The outro credit goes to Monday Night Football on ABC. Audio credit to Produzioni Europee Associati and United Artists. Video credits to the Big Ten Conference, ESPN, Poeta Training Center, CIStv and Earl Smith. Image credit to the University of ILLINOIS Athletic Department and the individual wrestlers and coaches. This video is not to be monetized.

Good enough to win two Big Ten duals for the ILLINI. Peter Marinopoulos was a true Freshman who gave up his redshirt to bump up to heavyweight because Luke Luffman was injured. As for the 197 pounder who started, he filled in for Zac Braunagel because of an Olympic redshirt. He was doing really well and progressing along until he injured his knee, then came back after surgery in about two or three weeks and finished the season. Both of those two are heroes, and I don't think their special situations help anybody's argument here. As for weight classes, the more the merrier. Why would anybody want fewer? There should be a weight class for every pound on the scale starting at 30 all the way to 1,000. Once you get past 1,000, it's not really wrestling any more.

This is a shock result for me. I've always pictured UNI as Nebraska, Junior.

Can't wait to hear what @MPhillips and the rest of those dastardly Buckeyes have to say.

WHAT: ILLINI vs. Ohio State Wrestling Dual WHEN: Friday, January 10 at 7:00 pm (Central) WHERE: Huff Hall, Champaign, ILLINOIS TV/STREAMING: BTN+ (subscription service) SPECIAL: It is an "Orange Out." Wear Orange. TICKETS: Admission is FREE! Question: Who is this? Answer: ESIW NHOJ NACIREMA LLA A DAY IN HISTORY It is February 18, 2007. Beyoncé and Nelly Furtado are #1 and #2 on the Hot 100 Billboard charts. Ghost Rider is raking in the dough as the #1 box office hit, but theater audiences are leaving unimpressed. It has a 28% on the Tomatometer at Rotten Tomatoes. The folks at home aren't doing much better. Your stupid little sister just got a video game called Karaoke Revolution: American Idol. That's right, a guitar hero for bad voices and terrible songs. It is worse than you thought imaginable. Have no fear! The entertainment and drama are happening right now in Huff Hall, as the 6th-ranked ILLINI seek to add another victory to their nine-match winning streak over Ohio State. But the circumstances are dire. The Buckeyes take an early 10-6 lead as the ILLINI forfeit at 125. It's getting worse. With just two matches left, the good guys are now trailing 12-18. Suddenly #14-ranked Roger Smith-Bergsrud upsets his #10-ranked Buckeye opponent. And just now, unranked Senior Matt Winterhalter, in his last dual match for the ILLINI, beats his OSU opponent 10-0 grasping that one bonus point that gives the home crowd a 19-18 victory and a 10th straight win over an Ohio State University team! Here's a link to the write-up at FightingILLINI.com, and here's the box score: Illinois 19, Ohio St. 18 Huff Hall // Champaign, Ill. Attendance: 1097 184: #3 Mike Pucillo (OSU) maj. dec. #16 John Dergo (ILL), 17-5 (0-4) 197: #12 Patrick Bond (ILL) dec. #6 J.D. Bergman (OSU), 6-5 (3-4) Hwt: John Wise (ILL) dec. Corey Morrison (OSU), 2-1 (6-4) 125: Will Livingston (OSU) win by forfeit (6-10) 133: #8 Jimmy Kennedy (ILL) dec. #17 T.J. Enright (OSU), 4-3 (9-10) 141: #12 Cassio Pero (ILL) dec. J Jaggers (OSU), 11-4 (12-10) 149: #13 Lance Palmer (OSU) maj. dec. Dan Zeman (ILL), 14-5 (12-14) 157: Jason Johnstone (OSU) maj. dec. Clint Arlis (ILL), 8-0 (12-18) 165: #14 Roger Smith-Bergsrud (ILL) dec. #10 Chris Vondruska (OSU), 3-1 (15-18) 174: Matt Winterhalter (ILL) maj. dec. Tommy Priestley (OSU), 10-0 (19-18) THE TEAMS The ILLINI are 6-0 on the season with wins over SIUE (41-3), Binghamton (30-10), Arizona State (37-6), Missouri (23-14), North Carolina (24-14) and Indiana (34-3). The Orange and Blue have racked up 189 team points to their opponents' 50. Ohio State is 8-0 so far. They have beaten Chattanooga (36-6), Edinboro (40-4), Hofstra (38-6), Pitt (20-17), UNC 23-11, Lock Haven (36-6), Iowa State (29-10), and just yesterday, Oregon State (40-3). As the Oregon State match is most recent, and it saw some lineup maneuvers from the Buckeyes, let's look at the Beaver box score: Lineup vs. the Beavers Wt. No. 5 Ohio State vs. Oregon State OSU ORE ST 125 No. 13 Maximo Renteria (ORE ST) def. No. 6 Brendan McCrone (OSU) | D, 6-5 0 3 133 No. 9 Nic Bouzakis (OSU) def. Damion Elliott (ORE ST) | MD, 11-3 4 3 141 No. 2 Jesse Mendez (OSU) def. Krayle Stormer (ORE ST) | TF, 17-2 9 3 149 No. 12 Dylan D'Emilio (OSU) def. Ayden Garver (ORE ST) | MD, 18-5 13 3 157 No. 9 Paddy Gallagher (OSU) def. Christopher Hamblin (ORE ST) | D, 6-4 16 3 165 No. 11 Sammy Sasso (OSU) def. Steele Starren (ORE ST) | D, 1-0 19 3 174 No. 11 Carson Kharchla (OSU) def. Sean Harman (ORE ST) | MD, 14-4 23 3 184 No. 14 Ryder Rogotzke (OSU) def. TJ McDonnell (ORE ST) F, 3:51 29 3 197 Seth Shumate (OSU) def. Vaun Halstead (ORE ST) | F, 5:39 35 3 HWT No. 7 Nick Feldman (OSU) def. No. 21 Brett Mower (ORE ST) | TF, 23-6 40 3 Don't get too worried, my friends. Half the guys wrestling for Oregon State were backups, and their highest ranked wrestler on Wrestlestat.com, #34 Maximo Renteria, won his match. In fact, the average Wrestlestat.com ranking for the other nine Beaver wrestlers was 109.7777777777778. Wrestlestat.com has predicted a 26-6 win for the Buckeyes against ILLINOIS, and that seems absolutely nuts to us. The only wins for the ILLINI are supposed to be Kannon Webster and Zac Braunagel. Edmond Ruth, who won in last year's dual in Columbus, is supposed to lose against a much worse opponent. Additionally, the algorithm indicates that Lucas Byrd, Luke Luffman, Braeden Scoles and Danny Brawlnagel will lose. That's not gonna happen. From the Vault. INDIVIDUAL MATCHUPS 125. #163 CAELAN RILEY vs. #5 Brendan McCrone. This is either a good time or a bad time for Caelan to wrestle McCrone. The Buckeye is 16-3 on the year, but is coming off an upset loss to Maximo Renteria. Does that spiral him into despair, does he question his abilities, or does he see it as a new challenge? McCrone pinned Renteria earlier in the season, but gave up a 5-6 loss yesterday. Riley is predicted to give up a tech fall, although the way these guys have done against common opponents suggests that the ILLINI can keep it close. McCrone is a pinner with a 68% bonus percentage this season, and for that reason, the Orange and Blue will take a decision loss, even a major here. 133. #3 LUCAS BYRD vs. #4 Nic Bouzakis. Can the beta version of Lucas Byrd beat Lucas Byrd? We don't think so. Bouzakis is strong, but so is Byrd, and Byrd is also more experienced, tactical and varied in his offense. The ILLINI 2x AA is 9-4 against the same guys who have given Bouzakis a 6-5 record. Wrestlestat.com's algorithm went haywire in predicting a one-point win for the Buckeye, who has losses to Ben Davino (possible starter here in his home state ILLINOIS) and Zeth Romney. We're feeling a 4-1 win for Byrd is the Wyrd. 141. #16 DANNY PUCINO vs. #1 Jesse Mendez. Almost exactly one year ago, at the dual in Columbus, this was a 12-2 major decision for the Buckeye. He has jumped levels since then, culminating in an NCAA Championship, but so has Pucino. We would like to see the Irish Italian Cyborg from Lockport keep this to a close decision. Wrestlestat.com is predicting a 9-4 win for the Scarlet and Gray. Danny is 8-1 on the season, while Mendez is 15-0. Their records against common opponents show that Mendez jumped levels much sooner than Pucino: Mendez is 15-1, while Danny is 9-11. 149. #7 KANNON WEBSTER vs. #11 Dylan D'Emilio. Last season in Columbus it was a beautiful cross-ankle pick that earned the win for Kannon against the OSU AA. See the video below, which also shows Edmond Ruth riding the **** out of Rocco Welsh as well as bonus Chris Moore handshake, perhaps the most legendary handshake in all of handshake history. The score was 4-1 last year. The Wrestlestat.com algorithm is predicting a closer 7-5 win for the Washington stud. Their common opponents tell a story, with Kannon sporting the better 4-1 record versus a 6-4 mark from the Buckeye. They have both lost to UNC's Lachlan McNeil recently. Webster's loss came in sudden victory on account of a disputed takedown. (We officially dispute it!). D'Emilio got punished by the Tar Heel 2-8. It has to be noted that the Buckeye is off to a great start this season with an 11-1 record. The rest of the Preview at this link.

Right weight ...... CHECK Fits the meme ... CHECK Comedy Gold ... CHECK!

Ouch. OSU wrestled really well. But, on the other hand, OSU wrestled poorly. The lineup for OSU wasn't what I expected, and on the other side of the mat, where was 197 pounder for OSU? For that matter, OSU was also missing their 197er. OSU's Ethan Stiles is a good one. Get him back to his home state! I've been waiting for this OSU match before publishing my preview of the January 10 ILLINOIS versus OSU dual. You know I have to send a bat signal to @ionel for this OSU battle, right? I'm happy that OSU won.

Ranking seafood preparations: 1. Cajun blackened. 2. Mom hand-breading my fresh crappies and sunfish. 3. Gumbo and Bisque. 4. Probably something French 5. Landry's (seafood restaurant) 6. Bonefish Grill (seafood restaurant) 7. Long John Silver's / Captain D's (fastfood restaurant) 8. High school cafeteria. 9. Hospital cafeteria. 10. Chef spits on your fish post-cooking. 11. Sushi.

Lucas Byrd v. Nasir Bailey The reemergence of the ILLINI as a national power. Webster and Scoles killing it. The Brawlnagels and Luffman back. Ruth at a new weight. This season has been anything but a downer for ILLINOIS fans.

You should start a Food Channel on this here platform. Besides being ironic on a site that worships weight cutting, I would come in hard on the Sushi versus Cajun Blackened Fish debate.

LOL! The AI has already punished my boy. Blue eyes?

TRAIN TO BUSAN This is the second movie in a row with subtitles that I’ve reviewed. I get a tweed jacket with elbow patches and a doctorate for that, no? This film was made in South Korea and features South Korean actors speaking something unintelligible, possibly Korean. It is also a movie about zombies. They are even less intelligible. When Train to Busan arrived in theaters in 2016, it was a few years past the high-water mark set by the flood of movies that featured reanimated corpses. The waters had receded after 28 Days Later (2002), Resident Evil (2002), Dawn of the Dead (2004), Shaun of the Dead (2004), I Am Legend (2007), 28 Weeks Later (2007), Zombieland (2009), World War Z (2013) and about 150 others. However, The Walking Dead was still in its television salad days. And that gives me a chance to tell you that zombies played an important role in my stand-up comedy act about ten or fifteen years ago. They’re pretty funny. As monsters go. It used to be that if you were young and nimble, the old school monsters like Frankenstein, the Mummy and Swamp Thing, and even the Night-of-the-Living-Dead zombies, were easy to evade. Once you saw one of them, you simply picked up your pace a little. [Walk across the stage, see a zombie, “Oh, a zombie,” walk slightly faster]. Or, lengthen your stride a bit. Maybe pump your arms. But times change. I blame Will Smith and Warner Brothers for upping the ante on zombies with their movie I Am Legend. You see, zombies can now sprint! The undead had become scarier. Even if you were watching out for the tree roots that seemed to trip up everybody in the old horror movies, and even if you were in decent shape, they could still getcha. Then in World War Z and later in Train to Busan, the zombies showed some minimal insect intelligence, usually based on trial and error, and yes, mostly error, but like an infinite number of monkeys typing for an infinite number of years, ten thousand zombies can make a lot of mistakes, but it only takes one zombie to get it right. Still, I think we haven’t seen the scariest zombie yet. That is, until we see the one who is super intelligent. Imagine you’re standing on your porch with a shotgun in your arms while a zombie stands in your field just exactly outside of shotgun range. [deadpan voice] Because he looked it up on Wikipedia. You’re staring at him staring at you, and he yells, “Oh for crying out loud, Charles, you’re gonna hafta sleep sometime!” Or, he says, “Okay. Screw you. I’m gonna get my own shotgun.” Then, as he turns around to ransack to the gun shop, he pauses, turns back around and pokes fun at himself and the stereotype he represents by saying, “And I almost forgot … BRRRAAAAAIIINNNS.” That would be a scary ******* zombie. Now back to the movie. Here be spoilers. It was fast-paced and energetic. I would say that it is the equal to or better than World War Z. Not quite as good as Zombieland, but that movie was scary and funny. The zombies in Train to Busan were just as ill-tempered, but the human cast included people we really hated and people we really rooted for. Folks who you wanted to survive, did not. That sucks, but it makes for a more powerful movie. The creatures here acted a little differently from past zombies. I would categorize the zombies from Night of the Living Dead as independent contractors. The World War Z creatures acted a lot like a colony of insects. Train to Busan zombies reminded me of a feeding frenzy of sharks attacking a school of fish. The monsters had some strange idiosyncrasies, though, including a weird “powering down mode” when the lights were shut off or when the train entered a tunnel. I think zombies should be fully functional in the dark. That’s when they’re the scariest! Moreover, during the daylight, a zombie is completely indistinguishable from a liberal arts major. The movie’s budget was $8.5 million, and that’s hard to believe because the zombie make-up alone must have cost seven figures. The budget for World War Z was approximately $200 million, and I can’t tell a difference. Train to Busan did steal one zombie affectation from World War Z, but the Koreans gave it their own little railroad twist. Can a zombie movie end in poetry and song? This one does, beautiful and bittersweet. Train to Busan made more than 10x their budget at the box office and deservedly so. It runs for 118 exciting minutes, has a 95% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and it’s well worth your time as a free movie on YouTube, and I mean on YouTube:

You are a bad boy. On another note, during the Who's No 1 mini-tournament they held a couple years back, it was Braeden Scoles who came closest to beating Ferrari without going over. So he was a The-Price-Is-Right kind of winner. Now folks are talking about Ferrari going 197 next season? Whoa.

P.S. You can pronounce it "Zach Braunagel" all you want, but you must spell it "Zac Braunagel." I'm serious about this.

In the silver brackets over to the Soldier Salute, they have this: "Double-elimination -- players that lose their first round gets consolation match." If I ever go postal, you'll probably hear on CNN about the guy holed up with hostages demanding that announcers and brackets and everybody else involved STOP referring to wrestlers as players. Also, there'll be some kind of demand about getting verb/noun agreement and spelling the name "Zac Braunagel" and not "Zach Braunagel."

I knew this would re-ignite the Pinfall Wars. LOL! If people claim the word is a redundancy, I disagree. Pinfall describes something different from a Tech fall. Seriously, people still use the term "Tech falls." Where are the Tech police? If you have a problem with "Pinfall," shouldn't you also have a problem with "Tech falls"? Is a Tech really a fall? What would the ancient Greek philosophers (and wrestlers) have to say about all of this?

The worst thing about the Soldier Salute brackets is that they don't include mat assignments. In a tournament with 8 to 10 mats running at one time, they need mat assignments. The funniest thing about the Soldier Salute brackets is that when you roll over the brackets with your cursor, it gives you the score and the time, but when you click on "Details," you also get the country. So far, all of the wrestlers have been from America.

I've been using Trackwrestling for the Midlands. The Southern Scuffle bout board doesn't provide mat assignments, which is basic. The problem with both is that to get to anything past mat four, I have to hit the down arrow on my laptop forty thousand times.

My goodness can Trackwrestling and whatever THAT THING that Soldier Salute is using as a bout board piss me off any more? Do you want to "View Final Result?" Yes I want to view final result. That's why I'm here! "Do I want to continue?" Of course you awful computer program! There will be a Letter to the Editor. The good news, though, is that West Virginia has a wrestler at the Midlands named Hoke Hogan. If Virginia Tech doesn't offer him a million dollar NIL deal, I will send a second Letter to the Editor!

You have a point, especially since you are a lobster of some sort. But here is the fly in the ointment: My next review of a free YouTube movie is about zombies....