MADISON, Wis. – The No. 22 Wisconsin wrestling team returns to action Nov. 29-30 at the 47th annual Midlands Championships in Evanston, Ill. Wisconsin is one of 31 teams from 11 different conferences competing at the two-day tournament.
The event will be televised on a tape delay on the Big Ten Network on Sunday, Jan. 3, 2010 at 6 p.m. (CT).
Wrestling begins at 9:30 a.m. Monday with the second session scheduled for 7 p.m. that night.Day two begins at noon with the finals set for 7 p.m.
At last year’s Midlands Championship, the Badgers finished in fourth place with three wrestlers finishing in the top six of their weight class.
This year, Wisconsin has four seeded wrestlers: No. 1 sophomore Andrew Howe at 165 lbs., No. 2 senior Kyle Ruschell at 149 lbs., No. 3 junior Trevor Brandvold at 197 lbs. and No. 5 redshirt freshman Tyler Graff at 133 lbs.
Wisconsin wrestlers will face tough competition as 11 teams at Midlands rank in the top 25, featuring the No. 1 and No. 2-ranked teams in the country, Iowa and Iowa State, respectively. Three No. 1 ranked wrestlers, four No. 2 ranked wrestlers and three wrestlers ranked third in the country in various weight classes will compete at the Midlands Championship.
Ruschell faces stiff competition at 149 lbs. as all eight pre-ranked wrestlers are nationally ranked in the top 20. Among those ranked include No. 1 Brent Metcalf of Iowa, No. 3 Kyle Borshoff of American, No. 8 Kevin LeVally of Bucknell and four others. Ruschell faced Metcalf in last year’s Midland’s Championship at 149 lbs. where Ruschell lost 14-5 to finish in second place.
Howe could once again face Jon Reader of Iowa State and Jake Kerr of Iowa whom he faced at last year’s Midlands Championship at 165 lbs. Reader beat Howe, 7-5, to knock him down to the fourth place match where he defeated Kerr, 7-3.
Brandvold finished in sixth place last year at 197 lbs after winning three matches and then forfeiting the fifth place bout. The 197 lbs. weight class features wrestlers such as No. 1 Jake Varner of Iowa State and No. 3 Hudson Taylor of Maryland.
Graff also faces tough competition at 133 lbs., where all but one of the pre-seeded wrestlers are ranked in the top 15 nationally.
Log on to UWBadgers.com Monday and Tuesday for updates from the 47th annual Midlands Championships.
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