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Correct, and it also resulted in the rule changes about matches against teammates and that injury defaults had to have “actual wrestling,” although the latter one still seems up for interpretation. But while 2020 was certainly shady, I’m not sure if there were any rules violations that could be easily proven. The best argument was probably for match fixing, but would be hard to prove unless someone admitted it. Even the seeding I don’t believe would have been against the rules if all the coaches agreed to them.

2020 was the bad year. It was a legit tournament in 2022 and 2023. In both years there was only one MFF in the finals and last year it was because it was 2 teammates. There were also some solid redshirts and a few top HS guys that attended as well. 2022 149 looks to be the strongest bracket and had 5 guys that are or would be ranked this year: Caleb Rathjen (champ), Paniro Johnson, Tagen Jamison, Drew Roberts and Blaine Brenner

Definitely should have used AJ for this one, especially with the “drive” pun

The last discussion on HR looks to be about his attending the Purdue dual on 1/19. There seemed to be quite a few still convinced he was hoping to join the team next year. @Hammerlock3 If I had to guess, I think he’s still in Iowa. @nhs67 probably not happy about this, but Brennan Swafford (who is still listed on the Iowa roster btw) has been in several of his recent posts, and also posted some of his own including posting a photo of them training MMA at Iowa Wesleyan on the same day AJ did. So if the pics are old Swafford would have to be in on it.

How many qualifiers is Lehigh projected to get?

Yeah, but that doesn’t really matter if there are D1 schools, namely Iowa, that are in fact not ignoring him. Which is what the OP seems to be trying to find out. I really have no idea.

Just needs to shoot more

If you’re referring to Brands, I think he just held it up and didn’t throw it

they should be forced to donate $1MM to Rutgers or something

Just finished watching and Sparks did acknowledge no replay available later on. Imagine if that happened in Iowa

And all of Nagao’s losses this year are “too 10ish,” so it can be argued he doesn’t have any bad losses this year.

At least he wasn’t scrolling through his phone this time

Amine, Woods, and Hendrickson all missed multiple consecutive matches. That usually suggests something was wrong. Pretty confident Shapiro was concussed. The only one that doesn’t belong on this list IMO is Nagao. He lost a bunch of matches in the regular season last year too but then turned it on for NCAA’s, so hopefully for him that’s what happens this year too.

It started as a “cynical” tournament, but after the criticism Dresser did clean it up. And the new MFF rules will further do so. I went back and looked at last year’s brackets and there were some pretty good guys there including some in redshirt. Looks like DeAugustino injury defaulted to Spratley in SV for example.

I didn’t think that one was a TD. Did they not review it at all though?

Again, 2 of the 3 guys you list had those negative feelings purely because of the competition within their individual training situations, both of which were several years after college. I will say that PSU is better at handling those types of situations as guys know there are no guarantees at PSU/NLWC. But I’m still going to agree to disagree on Metcalf. Like you said, he was a Brands guy, he didn’t start as an Iowa guy. He followed Brands from VT to Iowa, giving up a year of eligibility to do so. Went 1-1-2 in his 3 years competing, then wrestled for HWC for several years and left on good terms. He trained under Brands for what, 10 years? I don’t think he has negative feelings about his time there, even if he felt there was an “us against the world” culture. And heck, when he was hired at ISU, Dresser (an Iowa guy himself of course), hired 3 Iowa guys all at once. If the culture was so bad why would he do that? You mentioned St John previously, has he made any comments “that can be interpreted as negative”? Overall, I’ve heard athletes say only positive things about the Brands brothers as coaches. I don’t think there is anyone currently available that would do a better job than them. What do you suggest Iowa does? Back to the OP of this thread, it seems one suggestion is “new blood” for assistant coaches. I will say I haven’t heard athletes makes many comments at all about Morningstar/Telford, so sure that could be an option. But as I mentioned they’ve certainly had their share of successful upperweights. Even Glazier this year looks like an example of an upperweight having improved in the room. I’m guessing they’re already planning to, but they need to get Spencer Lee on the staff, although of course that wouldn’t necessarily help any perceived upperweight deficiency. He’s still an “Iowa guy,” but isn’t the prototypical grinder. I also wouldn’t totally disagree that the Brands brothers are kinda the same person and having both of them could be a little repetitive, so if Terry wants to head up his own program I’d certainly encourage that.

Is he out for the year?

Davidson probably got the idea from ISU, Marcus Coleman and owner of 4 injury default wins at the 2020 Last Chance Open is one of their coaches

Kudos for Lindenwood guys going considering they’re not eligible for NCAA’s and their team got dropped, although I know they’re just there to pad other guys’ records

You realize those 2 matches occurred over a span of 7 days right? Could be various other things going on, or not

Maybe we see Kueter vs Hutmacher after all

And if he didn’t do that he probably wins the match…

I’m most interested to see Truax’s adjustments vs Soldano, who’s kinda the same person as Rogotzke

Kizhan Clarke was German, right?

Hey @ILLINIWrestlingBlog, what’s up with Luffman? Injured? He hasn’t wrestled since Midlands