Takedown Report

Five B1G Takeaways from the Final Week of the Dual Season

Five B1G Takeaways from the Final Week of the Dual Season (2/28/2024)
We’ve reached the end of the regular season and the final week of duals did not disappoint. B1G Ten teams took the chance to go head-to-head with teams from other conferences to cap things off. 
Big Ten Goes 7-1 in Cross-Conference Competition
To finish off the regular season, Big Ten teams competed against out-of-conference competition and went 7-1. Wisconsin was the lone team that came out on the losing end of their dual meet against UNI. Of note, Iowa took out Oklahoma State in Stillwater, OK for the first time since 2015, Penn State pitched a shutout at home against Edinboro, and Nebraska took care of things in Tempe. 

Lovett Takes First Loss
Nebraska may have taken care of business against Arizona State, but the headliner was Kyle Parco handing top-ranked Ridge Lovett his first loss of the year. Parco scored the only takedown of the bout and added a stall point to get the 4-3 win. Lovett remains No. 1 despite the loss and should be the top-seed at the Big Ten tournament, but he won’t be going in with an unblemished record. 

Hawkeyes Get it Done on the Road
Not to be too redundant with my points of emphasis on this win for Iowa, but damn that was impressive. Oklahoma State hosted Iowa in what was a sold-out crowd in Gallagher-Iba Arena, and a Nationally televised matchup, against their biggest rival. Only one of those teams showed up ready to battle though, and it wasn’t the home team. Iowa seemed to pull the trigger on their attacks much more fearlessly, and with much more consistency, and as the dual kept going it looked worse for the Cowboys. If you’re an Iowa fan, this was a much-needed return to normalcy for them after a couple of tough weeks. They looked great as the season began, and they looked far and away like the second-best team in the country, until all of a sudden they didn’t. After the Michigan dual, I remember hearing a lot of talk about their offense, questions about their approach, and questions about their future, but this seemed like a strong way to answer those questions and to be prepared entering the B1G Tournament. The Hawkeyes still have some questions at 133 and 149 as far as who we will see out there competing at B1Gs, but for them, this seems like more of a luxury than a concern. Ladies and gentlemen, let the conference tournaments begin!!!

Matt Ramos Finishes Strong
We’ve made jokes most of the year about the curse of being ranked number 1 at 125. Yet here we are at the end of the regular season, at the same place we began, with Matt Ramos of Purdue ranked number 1 at 125 pounds. Despite early season losses to Jakob Camacho of NC State, and two losses at CKLV to Nico Provo of Stanford and Caleb Smith of Nebraska, Ramos has been quietly undefeated since. That stretch includes ranked wins over Anthony Molton of Campbell, Dean Peterson of Rutgers, Drake Ayala of Iowa, Eric Barnett of Wisconsin, and Patrick McKee of Minnesota. Despite the loss to Caleb Smith at the end of 2023, I would think that Ramos … story at … Intermatwrestle.com/Takeaways-from-the-final-week-of-the-dual-season-2282024

March 6, 2024 - Posted by The TakeDown Report | Uncategorized