Takedown Report

Why college wrestling should go bowling (as in football bowls)

TDR EDitor’s Note; An interesting article with some creative ideas for expanding coverage of wrestling and broaden the fan base.
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By Caryn Ward 1/3/2017 from InterMat Wrestling
From cheeseburgers to clothing to shampoo, any brand executive will tell you that to get more people to try your product, you have to get that product in front of more new people. The same goes for college wrestling. If college wresting wants to thrive and grow instead of stagnate and die it needs to increase its fan base. That’s a fact. To do that the sport needs to get fresh eyeballs. The current model is woefully inadequate for that. Right now fans have dual matches streamed live online and sometimes on the Big Ten Network. Fans have the big tournaments streamed live online. If they’re lucky the finals will air on a network, such as the Big Ten does with the Midlands. And fans have the NCAA Championships streamed and aired on an ESPN channel. That might get someone who is channel surfing to check it out, but it’s not going to bring new folks to the sport in the numbers needed. The one event that brought 42-thousand plus fans, many of them not the college wrestling-faithful, was the Grapple on the Gridiron in Iowa City in November of 2015. Iowa and Oklahoma State held a dual meet in Kinnick Stadium that brought in a record number of fans. It was done in conjunction with the Iowa versus Minnesota football game that night. The teams treated tailgaters, who were there anyway and might not ever watch college wrestling, to an exciting match in a unique environment. So to build on that model and take the concept to the next level, let’s have a college wrestling dual as part of college bowl game festivities in a warm weather city or even a domed stadium. Rest of the story at …. http://intermatwrestle.com/articles/17317?mc_cid=485bda824f&mc_eid=2ef7cbca4b

January 10, 2017 - Posted by The TakeDown Report | Uncategorized