Big Ten Championships 2014

Fi: CP's Ultimate Big 10 Breakdown

Fi: CP's Ultimate Big 10 Breakdown

Mar 4, 2014 by Christian Pyles
Fi: CP's Ultimate Big 10 Breakdown
Big 10 Sneak Peek
Christian Pyles

For those of you who are not yet Floinsider's consider this weight preview as a "freebie." Just because I love you guys!

If you ARE a Floinsider and want to access the entire article click right HERE

Big 10’s this weekend! Get excited people! In this preview I’m going to give you a write up on how I see things going through the bracket up until a champ is crowned.

You’ll see how many qualifiers each weight has earned as well as my final predictions of the qualifiers. In addition to final placements, I’ll give you my tiers which are a spacial representation of how I view the weights.  Space between guys represents a gap in ability.   Losing to someone within your tier doesn't surprise me.  If you lose to someone outside your tier, I'd be pretty surprised.  


141
Automatic Qualifiers-6

Pre Seeds
  1. Zain Retherford, PSU
  2. Logan Stieber, OSU
  3. Chris Dardanes, MINN
  4. Stephen Dutton, MICH
  5. Josh Dziewa, IOWA
  6. Steven Rodrigues, ILL
  7. Danny Sabatello, PUR
  8. Jessie Thielke, WIS

One of the most talked about weights this year, and it’s mainly because of your top two seeds here. Especially this pesky True Freshman who has no interest in playing 2nd fiddle for any amount of time to anyone.

With only 6 spots available there’s going to be some quality guys left at home when it’s time to head to OKC.
Zain Retherford announced himself with a SV win over Logan Stieber during their dual. Much speculation then followed as to whether Zain was really “on that level” or of Logan was simply not 100%. Throw in some officiating controversy and you’ve got a recipe for a dynamite rematch!

The Dutton v. Dziewa rematch in the quarterfinals will be one Iowa fans look to and highlight. If Iowa wants to make a run, they need Dziewa to have a big day. I think he gets it done against Dutton here.

In the respective semi finals I think the top seeds cruise. Zain will control a 4-2, 5-2 type of win against Dziewa who does not have the neutral game or turns to give Zain problems (yes, I know he took down Zain in the dual, won’t happen again). On the bottom half, I don’t expect much deviation for Logan from his National Duals beating he already laid on Chris Dardanes

Now to the final! I think Logan comes out and looks for that early TD and will dedicate a bit more to the ride. In the dual he got the TD, then an arm bar got blown for potentially dangerous. On the restart Logan wasn’t able to hold Zain down, and almost looked content to cut him loose and work more from his feet. Lesson learned. Though Zain is tremendously advanced in every area, I think Logan this time around gives him some problems from top.

Zain is extremely hard to takedown because once you get on his legs he is such a tremendous scrambler. Logan has shown he can finish on him. Logan will be 100% ready, I like Logan, and not by a little. I think he sends a message to the field that he’s the man to beat at 141. I think a turn is possible, and I see Logan getting away from bottom. Takedowns will be had for Logan as well.

CP’s 141 Predictions and Tiers:

1. Logan Stieber

2. Zain Retherford



3. Chris Dardanes
4. Josh Dziewa
5. Stephen Dutton

6. Danny Sabatello

Thanks for reading!  If you want to check out the other 9 weights along with team predictions access the ENTIRE article right HERE