4 Reasons You Have To Watch OK State vs UNI On Saturday
4 Reasons You Have To Watch OK State vs UNI On Saturday
Why you have to tune in and watch OK State vs UNI live on Flo on Saturday.
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#7 Oklahoma State travels to Cedar Falls, Iowa, to take on Big 12 rival Northern Iowa this Saturday. Here's why you need to tune in.
Watch Oklahoma State vs Northern Iowa Live on Flo
Jan. 25 I 8 PM EST
7 Ranked Wrestlers from Each Team
Both UNI and Oklahoma State are stacked from top to bottom with few major holes in the lineup. In fact, every weight will feature at least one ranked wrestler.
Projected Lineups
125: #4 Nick Piccininni (Oklahoma State) vs #16 Jay Schwarm (UNI)
133: Reece Witcraft (Oklahoma State) vs #25 Jack Skudlarczyk (UNI)
141: #18 Dusty Hone (Oklahoma State) vs #14 Michael Blockhus (UNI)
149: #3 Boo Lewallen (Oklahoma State) vs #11 Max Thomsen (UNI)
157: #20 Wyatt Sheets (Oklahoma State) vs Keaton Geerts (UNI)
165: #9 Travis Wittlake (Oklahoma State) vs Austin Yant (UNI)
174: Andrew Shomers (Oklahoma State) vs #5 Bryce Steiert (UNI)
184: #21 Anthony Montalvo (Oklahoma State) vs #4 Taylor Lujan (UNI)
197: #9 Dakota Geer (Oklahoma State) vs Jacob Holschlag/Noah Glaser (UNI)
285: Austin Harris (Oklahoma State) vs #13 Carter Isley (UNI)
4 Ranked Matchups
As you can see from above, there are going to be four ranked matchups going down Saturday night: 125, 141, 149, and 184. Now, Piccininni and Lujan are clear favorites over Schwarm and Montalvo at 25 and 84. 49 and 41 are very interesting, however.
The 141 match is a toss-up that could very well decide this dual. Both Blockhus and Hone wrestle a hard-nose and tough style, and both own a 6-4 win over AA Tariq Wilson this season.
133 is another match that is crucial for both teams in this dual. Skudlarczyk is the favorite, but Witcraft is more than capable of winning this match.
But the match I’m looking forward to most is…
Boo Lewallen vs Max Thomsen
149 is going to be a match between two All-Americans who have split matches. In 2018 the two wrestled three times with Thomsen winning the first and Lewallen winning the last two.
The difference-maker in this match is whether or not Thomsen is able to finish his shots. In their NCAA match two years ago, Thomsen was in on Lewallen’s legs numerous times, but could only turn those shots into points a fraction of the time. And to make matters worse, Lewallen scored one of his two takedowns from a front head position that Thomsen put himself into while taking a shot.
I expect Thomsen to be able to get to the legs of Lewallen, so it’s somewhat of an obvious statement that applies to every match, but if Thomsen is able finish, he should win or vice versa if he isn’t able to.
Either Team Could Win This Dual
Both UNI and Oklahoma State have a legitimate shot at winning this dual. I have UNI as the clear favorite at three weights (174, 184, and 285) and Oklahoma State as the clear favorite at four weights (125, 157, 165, and 197). This dual will be decided at 133, 141, 149 and with bonus points.
197 with a healthy Jacob Holschlag, who was a 2018 All-American, becomes a great match as well. However, since Holschlag got hurt against Lucas Davison in his first match of the season, he’s only wrestled one match, and didn’t look 100 percent.
UNI will also get a slight advantage with this dual being held in Cedar Falls. UNI is even expecting so many fans to come out, they moved this dual out of historic West Gym and into the McLeod Center.
For the record, OSU is 27-2-0 all-time against UNI with the losses coming in 1991 and 1985.