1. 109 and counting
This week’s additions of women’s wrestling programs at Division II Grand Valley State University in Michigan and Division III Simpson College in Iowa brings the grand total of announced or competing women’s varsity programs to 109, with 10 of them now in Iowa, a state that’s yet to sanction high school girls wrestling. One fact that isn’t lost about the Grand Valley State gift that helped bring wrestling back to campus is the relationship to wrestling by school president Philomena Mantella. Her son, Vic Avery, was an All-American at Edinboro. Grand Valley graduate Gary Chopp was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame with the Medal of Courage last summer and the big gift goes to alums John and Diane Harris. As for Simpson, it’s the one in Indianola, Iowa and now both Simpson’s, including Simpson University in California, will have both men’s and women’s wrestling programs.
2. Big Bonus for Indy
With only three duals on the schedule for Tuesday night, they’re all gonna get some love. Division II Indianapolis scored bonus victories in all 10 bouts with two forfeits, five falls and three technical falls to shut out Division III Defiance College 57-0. Ranked 13th to start the year, UIndy’s been solid on the D2 scene for a while, but Defiance is a relatively young program – reinstated in 2018. They’re currently led by one of the youngest head coaches in college wrestling, 2020 Ashland graduate Chandler Minnard. Technically he’s the “acting” head coach, but I don’t think he’s playing a role. Minnard’s still looking for his first win as head coach, while UIndy’s Jason Warthan just won his 100th.
3. The No Reports: Waldorf upends Graceland
Bet you didn’t expect two Waldorf references in back-to-back days, did you? After Waldorf alum Bo Bettinson led the St. Ambrose Bees to the program’s first win, the Warriors of Waldorf, which is in Forest City, Iowa, opened the season with a Heart of America Conference win over Graceland 30-24. Sadly, the box score and recap wasn’t in my inbox, on the web or reported on Trackwrestling by the time I hit record. Montana State-Northern shut out Northwest College of Wyoming in what appeared to be 31-0 according to the live stream. Of course, all these scores will be updated and posted at Collegewrestlingscoreboard.com and on Rokfin.
4. Journeymen Wrestling announces the pools
While not a new iteration of the National Duals, rather a different event with a different format, Frank Popolizio’s Collegiate Duals will have an impressive field just before Christmas on Florida’s Gulf Coast. It will have a lot of the big dogs in Division I wrestling, including Penn State and Iowa, but don’t expect to get to see two of the nation’s premier programs go head-to-head then hit the beach. With two pools and teams avoiding conference duals, the field should provide some excellent dual competition with one pool seeing – according to the NWCA Division I Coaches Poll – No. 1 Iowa, No. 3 Missouri, No. 5 NC State and No. 24 Lehigh with Oregon State and Central Michigan and the other seeing second-ranked Penn State, No. 6 Virginia Tech, No. 8 Arizona State, No. 13 Cornell, No. 17 Northern Iowa and Hofstra.
5. Rankings time!
In addition to the NWCA Coaches Poll and the Division III regional and national rankings released on November 1, the NJCAA dropped its rankings into the inboxes of coaches and media late at night, meaning they get the final spot in today’s five juicy news nuggets in the Wrap Sheet. Clack-to-Clack-to-Clack National Champions Clackamas starts the year ranked No. 1, just one point ahead of Ken Kepley’s Pratt Community College Beavers. Western Wyoming, NEO and Indian Hills, not one of your usual suspects in the top five, rounding out the top teams to start the year. Pratt has three No. 1s, while Clackamas and Indian Hills each have two.
Matches of note for Wednesday, November 3: Division III Alma’s at Division II Davenport, not sure if Tommy Bloodround is reffing that one. E-Town takes on Shippensburg in the Keystone State in another D2-D3 tilt, Elmira finally gets to take the mats for the first time as they face Alfred State up in New York, Lincoln Memorial also debuts against Emory & Henry. More going on in Southwest Virginia as Washington & Lee will take on Ferrum and two Division I teams are in action as Campbell hosts NAIA Montreat and The Citadel hosts Queens. True story, I was in a movie with Queens assistant coach Paul Bradley. Yup, that one.
