maligned

Indianapolis sits in 10th place partway through the consi semi's. Mejia (Elkhart Memorial grad), Blubaugh (Bloomington South), and Streck (Merrillville) all go for national titles at 8pm ET tonight, streaming for free here: https://www.ncaa.com/event/4443

As a Goshen guy, I'm sorry for not noticing that's how he accidentally had it. Ha!

And Derek Blubaugh! He heads to his 3rd straight National Championship match at 197 with a heart-stopping last-second takedown and victory. He's lost the final 6-0 and 1-0 the last two years to #1 Dalton Abney of C. Oklahoma. Very sadly, that's his only D2 loss this season (5-0) and his opponent in the finals. Derek's a beast. He's got a couple D1 wins to his credit this year to go with the 2-time runner-up credentials. Here's hoping he can finally get over the hump and get the upset!! And Shawn Streck follows suit and joins the Indiana procession into the finals. He continues a dominating tournament with a 13-4 win the semi's. He'll look to repeat as national champion tonight at 285. He'll go in as the favorite against his 4th-seeded opponent.

WOW! Christian Mejia! He comes in as the 3-seed, having lost only to the top two seeds during the year. Facing the 2-seed, who beat him 9-2 during the year, he hips into a high-c attempt and takes him to his back for the pin only a minute into the match!! He's been on the podium twice before, and now he gets his shot for a title tonight! He'll face the 4-seed, who took out the top seed, and who was the runner-up at this event last year.

In addition to Blubaugh, UIndy has another guy in the semi's and a third that's in the consis with an AA spot locked up. Those 3 AAs put Indianapolis in 9th place.

Sadly, all 5 of these guys got knocked out in the evening session tonight. Wabash has James Day in the semifinals at 125. They are in 17th place.

Mejia, Blubaugh, and Streck all advance to the semifinals at 11am tomorrow morning. All 3 are officially All-Americans. Congratulations!

Burge and Cervantes won in the first session. Langeman, Herrera, and Layman are alive in the consolations. Wabash has 3 in the Round of 16, 2 alive in the consolations, and 1 eliminated. Langeman is Trine's only participant. Wrestling continues at 7pm Eastern on the NCAA.com website by going to the "Live Video" list (not available on demand, sadly)

The national title contenders Mejia, Blubaugh, and Streck all won easily in the first session today. Sadly, Jose Diaz was in a pigtail and already went 0-2. Indianapolis has two alive (including Blubaugh) in the Round of 16 and two alive in the consolations. Wrestling resumes at 6pm Eastern and is free to view on the NCAA.com website by going to the "Live Video" list (not viewable on demand, though, sadly)

...and honestly you could even just use that "who placed higher last year?" as a stand-in for head-to-head if there's no current-year head-to-head. Then you wouldn't need to even change the rest. It would just have to be super-restricted to only the scenario where at least one was AA and they wrestled in the same bracket as each other the prior year.

This is 100% the issue. The seeding assumes there will be enough matches wrestled for the criteria to play itself out correctly. But often there aren't enough matches and the seeding ends up looking mechanical instead of intuitive--because we all know the past years' results. The seeding is determined by putting each guy's results against each other guy's results and seeing who wins the most head-to-head criteria "battles." If I were in charge, I would take some points away from a few criteria and include about 20% for a new element: if they were in the same weight as each other in the previous year and if at least one was AA, who placed higher? That simple piece of knowledge is what makes human rankings seem more intuitive than the seeds.

The criteria is biased against guys like Vito with limited matches wrestled also: Head-to-head competition — 25 percent Quality wins — 20 percent Coaches Ranking — 15 percent Results against common opponents — 10 percent RPI — 10 percent Qualifying event placement — 10 percent Win % — 10 percent If you put him up against Orine and Shawver, for example, Vito loses quality wins (20 percent), Win% (10 percent), Qualifying event placement (10 percent). He wins Coaches rank (15) and possibly RPI (10). There are no head-to-heads and common opponents are most likely a wash because Vito didn't face many guys. There are a couple nuances with how these things get applied, but you see how it's an uphill battle for a guy with the two negatives of 1) limited matches wrestled and 2) a loss or two on his record.

They're very rigid with their seeding formula because it's very intuitive in slotting guys correctly--IF the top guys have all wrestled a lot of matches and seen other top guys. But it rigidly considers MFFs at conference tournaments the same as regular losses, and it blindly ignores previous years' results or non-NCAA matches like the All-Star classic. So if Carr or Arujau haven't seen this year's top guys and theyve lost twice, they get put behind the undefeated or one-loss guys.

Brackets for nationals came out tonight: Indiana natives: C. Rooks, #32 Lemley, #8 Mendez, #1 G. Rooks, #17 Lee, #11 Baumann, #32 Bates, #33 Allred, #10 Davison, #10 Willham, #32 Others from Purdue: Ramos #4 Clark #29 Blaze #23 Buell #24 Others from IU: Fongaro #23 Lillard #17

Tentative rotation: 2024 Maryland2025 Northwestern 2026 Penn St. (brought back in after only 5 years bc of no-fan covid edition in 2021)2027 Purdue2028 Illinois2029 Wisconsin2030 Ohio State2031 Iowa2032 Indiana2033 Michigan State2034 Minnesota2035 Rutgers2036 Nebraska2037 Michigan

It's official. Northwestern in 2025; Penn St. in 2026 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.pennlive.com/penn-state-wrestling/2024/03/penn-state-wrestler-carter-starocci-earns-at-large-bid-to-ncaas-nittany-lions-to-host-big-tens-in-2026.html%3foutputType=amp

As someone said on another thread, Bates gets in and Washington, Boarman, Sollars miss out.

You mean which wrestlers? Or who's going to watch?

I wonder I he would have been better off going all MFFs at Big 10s. He'd have had a 25 ranking and he could have communicated to selection committee that he'll be recovered finally for nationals after 3.5 weeks off. Now, he's put 2 more performances out there way below his level and given them clear reasoning to leave him out of the tournament if they want since they know he's hurt.

I just mentioned him because recent RTC info still lists him as a resident athlete (and the other guys mentioned are in fact still competing). You're right, though...not sure he's actually been at it.

100% agree. Starting with him winning one of his losses, there are actually about 12 scenarios around the country that would have gotten Boarman in if he indeed misses out.

Ha, no. I just knew Boarman is 7th in line with 6 spots available, and I noticed Cayden would have faced Teske/Van Dee with normal seeding of Teske--but I wanted to spell it out if people didn't know how the system worked.

Sadly, Blake Boarman, Chattanooga (Evansville Mater Dei) 133, got put to his back and pinned when he was leading 8-0 in a match that he needed to secure a spot at NCAA nationals this weekend. Double sadly, even though he was in a good spot in the Coaches' ranking and RPI to get an at-large bid if he lost, the 133 results went haywire across the country. A full 8 of the 27 guys at that weight who earned automatic allocations for their conferences did not earn the automatic bids. There are only 6 at-large bids to be handed out, and, as it turns out, among those 8 unlucky losers, Blake is ranked 7th. He would be the final guy not to get into the tournament at 133 if the committee decides to stick to its pre-tournament assessments. Several of the other "losers" were ranked near him, and I'm not sure what's happening with the injury situation of Wells from Minnesota, so not all is lost. But it's not looking great. So here's a twist: In the Big Ten, Bouzakis of Ohio St. and Wells of Minnesota didn't earn their allocations and stand in front of Boarman in the line for that last NCAAs bid. One of the things that happened there was a seeding glitch: Brody Teske of Iowa didn't get a seed (well..automatically fell to 14th) because he won the Iowa wrestle-off too late for his information to be submitted for a seed. He takes out 3-seed Bouzakis, who falls into the wrestle backs and loses to 4-seed Van Dee. If Teske had been seeded, he would have been the #6, and he would have had a first round match with Cayden Rooks, who would have dropped a line from his given #10 to #11. Even if Cayden had wrestled lights out, he would have arguably lost that match to the hot Teske. Making a long story short...Bouzakis would have likely gotten 4th to 6th, even with how he wrestled this weekend; Teske would have placed about the same as he did; and Rooks would have had to face Van Dee of Nebraska in the Consi 2nd Round. Assuming he'd lost that match as he did this weekend (11-6), Bouzakis would have gotten the automatic bid and Rooks wouldn't have. ....And Blake Boarman would be sitting in the final NCAAs bid position instead of one spot out. Obviously, Cayden Rooks earned his spot, and Indiana wrestling fans who know his story--among whom I am one--are ecstatic. And obviously Blake Boarman put himself where he is by not finishing the job on Saturday. But what a twist of fate that one Indiana native who just lost 9-8 to another Indiana native just a couple weeks ago might have subbed in to his NCAAs spot in his last-gasp year--in part because of a seeding rule technicality!

I agree with your thought that it's a big deal for IU to get this many too. Nothing would be better for recruiting and drawing attention to the RTC than if Lee and Rooks are All-Americans and Red, Moran, Lacey, and others keep banging on the freestyle circuit.

Yeah, IU and Ohio St. are the two that stand out as being much better duals teams than tournament teams. OSU were 2nd in the duals standings and are going to end up with all 10 at nationals, but finished 5th. IU ends up 12th, but were tied for 7th in the duals standings and will end up as high as tied for 6th in number of qualifiers once things shake out.