Arizona State wrestling coach Zeke Jones has been around long enough to know that a ride to the top floor doesn’t come without stops.

Jones, who since 1990 has coached in the EWL, EIWA and Pac-12, with a stint as coach of USA Wrestling in between, is in his ninth year at the helm of the Sun Devils and is 79-37 overall. He was a member of Arizona State’s only NCAA wrestling championship team in 1988 and is striving to be the coach of the next Sun Devil title team.

While ASU has carted home a fourth-place team trophy from the last two NCAA Championships, Jones is realistic enough to know that traversing those final three floors is challenging. Each time the door opens, a team from the Big Ten or Big 12 is not letting anyone else in.

“It seems like this nine-year ascension … Arizona State has done nothing but improve for nine years in a row,” Jones said. “It's been a steady climb. It's been an upward climb. And now we're getting into that upper group where at some point, we're going to level off. We're starting to level off and, personally, I want to level off at #1.

“We're seeming to level off in that three through six range, and we might need to; we might need to plateau and hold it before we can make that next jump. And I think we do, not that we want to, but I think that's what's happening. And in order to make that next ascension to that #1 spot, it's going to take a couple more really good recruits, but we're also going to need to develop what we have in our room.”

That, according to Jones, is happening. 

“I think we've done a nice job of developing kids,” he said. “Kids like Brandon Courtney (125) and Kordell Norfleet (197), they weren't top-five kids in the country coming out of high school. They won a lot in high school. But for whatever reason, those ranking services didn't have them as high. 

“(Kyle) Parco (149), too. We've had to develop some kids and I think we've done a nice job of developing our kids. We just need more of them. And we need to continue to develop them.”

The way Jones sees it, the air is thin at the top. 

“Everybody's gasping for the little oxygen that's there, and we've just got to keep fighting and getting better and keep improving,” he said. “But I do think we're a team where our kids do get better, so we just have to continue to improve and keep working individually on what we need to work on in the areas of concentration to make us better.”

Support Is There

Jones said the Pac-12 Conference — actually the Pac-6 in wrestling with Arizona State, Cal Poly, CSU Bakersfield, Arkansas-Little Rock, Oregon State and Stanford — wants to expand.

“Over the last two to three years with the leadership and our associate commissioners, Teresa Gould and Chris Merino in the Pac-12 office, they want to see wrestling grow and thrive,” Jones said. 

“We are in a position to expand and grow and that is going to happen. I do think through this natural order of football and what happens with these conferences, we'll probably be swept up in some decisions that are made through the Pac-12’s TV contract or the Big 12’s TV contract, and I think it's only going to make us bigger and stronger; it can’t make us worse. So at the end of the day, I think we're gonna get stronger,” he added. 

Always A Catch

Scheduling can be perplexing for Jones, the ASU program and the conference overall. The Sun Devils typically head to Pennsylvania and other Eastern locations at least twice a year. So does Oregon State, which on Dec. 11 was at Penn State and this week is in New Orleans for the Collegiate Duals.

“The one challenge we do have, and it's a problem in wrestling, is scheduling,” Jones said. “The Big Ten schedules itself and it makes it difficult to schedule anybody else. I've been here 10 years and look at how many times we’ve wrestled Penn State, Oklahoma State (Big 12), Iowa … and you can put anybody else on there … Ohio State, Michigan, and it's not very much, if at all. And it's not for us lacking to ask them, we ask them every year.”

The Sun Devils did have a home-and-home with Penn State 2018 and 2019, losing 41-3 at Penn State but stopping the Nittany Lions’ 60-match winning streak (19-18) at home in 2019. ASU also faced PSU in the Collegiate Duals in 2021. They haven’t faced Iowa since 2008, or closer-to-home Oklahoma State since 2014. Other Big Ten teams, such as Michigan and Ohio State, have dotted the schedule in Jones’ tenure six times combined.

Jones understands the root of the problem. 

“They (B1G teams) already have a tough schedule because they have to wrestle everybody in their conference, just about,” he said. “But that leaves teams like us and Oklahoma State — although Oklahoma State has their relationships built — but we’re the ones who get left out.

“We’ve got to figure out the scheduling thing to where it is more equitable because you can see it’s hard for us to schedule those elite teams. Again, it’s not for a lack of us asking, but it just becomes challenging for them because of their rules and requirements scheduling within their conference. We’re a small conference with not many traditional schools with bigger programs, so we have to schedule outside the conference. But if you can’t get those other teams to wrestle, what do you do?”