NCAA Rankings 2018-19

Nolf-ing To It!

Last year's top three 157-pounders return, plus two other All-Americans, making the top five of the preseason rankings a fairly straightforward process. We're speculating that Ke-Shawn Hayes will be up at 157 for the Buckeyes but it's all up in the air at this point. But Hayes and Ryan Deakin — who we also expect to move up to 157 — slot in nicely in the next two spots. 

Kennedy Monday's got two outstanding wins to his name in Joey Lavallee and Tyler Berger, which was enough for us to put him ahead of John Van Brill, who split matches with Monday last season. 

Paul Fox can be inconsistent at times but he turns it on in March. He's gone seventh and round of 12 in two trips to the NCAAs, which earns him a place above the very nice Steve Bleise, who is moving up a weight along with almost half of the entire Minnesota lineup. 

The weight class graduated a lot of talent from the previous season, so there will be a lot of new names in the bottom half of the rankings. Expect a lot of turnover as the season progresses. With that said, we like Luke Weiland as the highest rankings newcomer. He's got a good number of wins against national qualifiers and few, if any, "bad" losses. 

We're expecting to see Gordon Wolf and Kaleb Young down two weights from 174 to 157. They both had solid seasons in the upper weights and we think they'll do well here. Some other names outside the top 20 to keep an eye on include Andrew Shomers of Oklahoma State (by way of Edinboro), Alex Mossing of Air Force, Alex Klucker of Lock Haven, Austin Kraisser of Campbell, and Zaner Wick of Wisconsin. 

*Please note: the original posting of these rankings placed Shields, Pantaleo and Berger in a different order. 

Want to get in touch with the rankers? Follow Christian and Andrew on Twitter @CPyles8 and @SpeyWrestle or email: christian.pyles@flosports.tv or andrew.spey@flosports.tv