Merry Christmas and happy holidays wrestling fans! We’re at the inflection point of the college season, where the events and tournaments of November and December transition into the intra-conference dual meets, which lead us into the postseason. It will be here before you know it!

Now let’s get on with the roundup before this winter storm does to us what the San Angeles Penitentiary system did to John Spartan and we don’t wake up from our cryogenically induced slumber until after the Franchise Wars when cursing is illegal and we all have to learn how to use the three seashells. 

Last week’s roundup

The Wintery Wonderous Wassailing Dual of the Century, of the Week

Iowa State vs Cornell: Big Trouble in the Big Easy

Journeymen Wrestling’s Collegiate Duals was the biggest D1 event of week 8 by a considerable margin, and it was thanks to exciting matchups like this one between the Cyclones and the Big Red. ISU and Cornell were #8 and #10 respectively in the National Dual Meet Rankings heading into the event. 

With Cornell missing their returning All-American Jonathan Loew at 184, and with Iowa State’s top 10 heavyweight Sam Schuyler out with an injury, Cyclone head coach Kevin Dresser took a gamble and decided to bump up his last three weights. 

Dresser sent Joel Devine, a national qualifier caliber backup at 174, out to take the mat at 184. Devine got the final segment of the dual started in the Cyclone's favor by beating Cornell’s Evan Canoyer. 

Next, ISU’s fifth-ranked 184-pounder Marcus Coleman bumped up to 197 and beat Cornell’s U20 92kg world teamer Jacob Cardenas. Lastly, #2 ranked 197-pounder Yonger Bastida slid up to heavyweight and defeated the Big Red’s #15 ranked 285-pounder Lewis Fernandes. Thus, the Cyclones won the dual and their pool in thrilling fashion, and Flo's resident ISU alum Cyon Williams did much rejoicing. 

And that was the drama from but one of the many matches at the event. There was so much more to digest from New Orleans (and I’m not talking about the beignets). 

More From New Orleans

For instance, there was a Ranker’s Delight at 197 in the A pod of the Red Pool. A ranker’s delight is when wrestler A beats wrestler B, who beats wrestler C, who beats wrestler A. So all three guys end up with a 1-1 head-to-head record against each other. Rankers love seeing that. They go wild for it, which is why it’s called a Ranker’s Delight!

In New Orleans, Lehigh’s then #5 Michael Beard majored NC State’s then #9 Isaac Trumble, who pinned Cal Poly’s then #8 Bernie Truax, who beat Beard 3-2. Margin of victory doesn’t factor into FloWrestling rankings, however, previous wins and losses do, and sometimes even last year's NCAA tournament results are consulted, although not often. 

Thus, Beard, who also has a win over Max Dean this season, is ranked highest, and Truax, who lost to Trumble but has a win over Beard, and has a better 2022 NCAA finish, is still ranked ahead of Trumble. 

You can read the full explanation and peruse all the latest rankings here. 

Other major upsets and matches that shook up the national rankings include Oregon State’s then #8 Trey Munoz’s 8-4 victory over then #5 Marcus Coleman, and Marcus Coleman’s 9-7 shocker over #1 Aaron Brooks, the returning national champ and heavy favorite to repeat. 

MARCUS COLEMAN!! 👏

He takes out No. 1 Aaron Brooks, 9-7!

🌪🚨🌪 pic.twitter.com/og1iOCHifv

— Iowa State Wrestling (@CycloneWR) December 21, 2022

That match was the upset of the week, if not the season so far. 

There was also a big team upset when then #20 Northern Iowa defeated then #4 Ohio State in the early rounds of the wrestling extravaganza. The massive dub for the Panther Train was fueled by UNI’s then #24 Colin Realbuto’s 9-7 victory over then #3 Sammy Sasso. 

That’s a BADDDDD MAN!

Down goes #3!!! #PantherTrain l #EverLoyal pic.twitter.com/WUxEcvwc3B

— UNIWrestling (@UNI_wrestling) December 19, 2022

Additionally, UNI's Tyrell Gordon, who bumped up from 197 before the start of last season, got a clutch win over OSU's All-American Tate Orndorff at heavyweight to seal the deal for the Panthers. 

Panther fans were also able to enjoy watching Parker Keickesen hit a wild suicide cradle on NC State's Trent Hidlay in which Keckeisen tip-toed the out-of-bounds line before securing the fall over the 2021 NCAA finalist. Quite a very productive outing for the Panthers. 

PK’s pin over Hidlay. Misdirection single, chased to the edge, jumped for the cradle, suicide for the fall. Absolutely insane.

“If you’re scared, go to church.” – @knarkill pic.twitter.com/Zpy5jpnS52

— Cody Goodwin (@codygoodwin) December 21, 2022

And of course, there were the champs, Penn State and NC State. I call them both champs because neither pool overlapped, so it was like two dual meet tournaments with six teams apiece happened simultaneously, hence, two champs.

Congratulations NC State - 2022 Collegiate Wrestling Duals Red Pool Champions! @PackWrestle @jmenwrestling pic.twitter.com/jjBeA7EEyb

— SJanicki Photo (@SJanickiPhoto) December 21, 2022

Congratulations Penn State - 2022 Collegiate Wrestling Duals Blue Pool Champions!!! @pennstateWREST @jmenwrestling pic.twitter.com/1NcukPmJLW

— SJanicki Photo (@SJanickiPhoto) December 21, 2022

The final standings and the teams' national dual rankings and records from the event are below.

Red Pool

1. #12 NC State (3-0)
2. #13 Northern Iowa (2-1)
3. #9 Ohio State (2-1)
4. #18 Lehigh (1-2)
5. Cal Poly (1-2)
6. Lock Haven (0-3)

Blue Pool

1. #1 Penn State (3-0)
2. #4 Iowa State (2-1)
3. #10 Cornell (2-1)
4. North Carolina (1-2)
5. Oregon State (1-2)
6. Central Michigan (0-3)

The painstakingly assembled box scores for week 8, including every countable match from New Orleans, can be found here. 

And now for a minor digression with regards to the Collegiate Duals. 

A couple of puzzling theories were brought to my attention on everyone’s favorite toxic social media app. One, was that our Collegiate Duals Watch Party was in some way an attempt to sabotage live streaming that was being done by Rokfin. I can assure you, dear reader, that nothing could be further from the truth. 

Watch parties are non-rivalrous to the actual live event. It's a second-screen experience. No one is going to skip the real thing and solely enjoy a watch party. It simply won't happen. 

Watch parties are content, and content creates hype, and hype creates FOMO. And the more FOMO the better! An event can never have too much FOMO. It's not a zero-sum game. One platform creating more FOMO does not subtract from the total amount of FOMO, it just adds to it! 

FloWrestling has done watch parties before. Other platforms have done them. Twitch exists because of them. They will probably keep happening on Flo and everywhere else for a long time. They're admittedly not for everyone but plenty of people do enjoy them. And because people enjoy them, the platform with the watch party gets engagement and the platform with the live event gets more hype. It's a win-win. It's why we at Flo encourage, nay, implore other content creators to host their own watch parties for events Flo streams. Please do. Go nuts with the watch parties! 

The other bizarre notion that crossed by timeline was that Flo's autogenerated ‘how-to-watch’ guide for the Collegiate Duals Watch Party was some sort of attempt to trick people into thinking archives of the actual matches would be available on Flo, and not simply perfunctorily telling people that archives of the watch party itself will be available. 

These how-to-watch articles are churned out for every live event (including watch parties) for every sport Flo streams, all using the exact same language. The topic is, to me, too insane to warrant additional debunking so please allow those links to disabuse you of any such conspiracy theories and let us never speak on this goofy subject ever again. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

Other Awesome Duals

Mizzou Triumphs Over The Bison

The Tigers hosted the Thundering Herd of NDSU, and you can watch all the matches here! North Dakota State has a salty squad, but the Tigers are even saltier, with all ten of their starters making an appearance, including five Tigers in the top 10. 

Highlights from the dual include Mizzou's #9 Allan Hart pinning NDSU's #11 Dylan Droegemueller at 141 and #1 Rocky Elam of Missouri defeating #24 Owen Pentz of ND State at 197.

You can watch Hart's first period pinfall in the video below. 

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But it wasn't all roses and daisies for the Tiger faithful -- and what is being a college sports fan but to be buffetted by the alternating vicissitudes of glory and lament? -- as #6 Jared Franek beat #13 Jarrett Jacques at 157.

The Creek Rises To Three More Wins

Campbell defeated Purdue, Utah Valley and Drexel at the Purdue Duals (the PurDuals?). That pushed the Camels' season record over .500 to 5-4. It's not often that a program from the Southern Conference can claim wins over teams from the Big Ten, Big 12, and EIWA all in one day, but that is exactly what Campbell did. 

George Mason Starts The Year 8-0

The Patriots of Fairfax County took the Clara Barton Parkway (probably) past a bunch of neighbohoods I used to live in and met the Eagles of American in Washington, DC for a dual meet last Sunday. 

After a victory in our nation's capitol, the Patriots traveled to Clinton, South Carolina for a contest in less swampy environs. There they wrestled the Duke Blue Devils and Presbyterian Blue Hose in the Eifel 65 Duals. Blue wasn’t just the color that the other teams wore, it was also their feelings after suffering defeat at the hands of George Mason, who ran their record to 8-0, which you likely already guessed due to the headline. 

Looking Ahead

Make sure you save some egg nog for next week, as the Midlands & Soldier Salute are both taking place on December 29-30 and both are streamed in the entirety on BTN+. Northwestern hosts the Midlands with Wisconsin, Arizona State, and many others joining them. Iowa, UNI & SDSU and more will be at the Xtreme Arena in Coralville, IA for the Solider Salute, in the same venue that just hosted the excellent UWW World Cup. 

Make sure to say hi to our guy Shane Sparks if you see him in Chicago/Hoffman Estates for Midlands. 

And then we Scuffle in the New Year in Chattanooga. The Southern Scuffle will straddle weeks 9 & 10, starting on Sunday, January 1 and concluding the next day on Monday, January 2. 

And then it's dual meet season! 

Speaking of duals, here's a joke I just thought of that I include for you now as a Christmas present. 

Me going to the Dua Lipa concert: “Hi I’m here for Dua Lipa.” 

Someone hands me 2 beers: “No I said Dua Lipa not dual IPAs.”

Hmm... well they can't all be winners. Sorry you can't return this one for store credit. 

That's all for this week. Hope you roasted some tasty chestnuts and Jack Frost didn't nip too hard on your nose. See you next week!