THE ILLINI WRESTLING BLOG AND FORUM

If you watched the NCAA Tournament, you just saw how important Greco skills are to wrestling. Not just the throws, but also the holds, but, yeah, especially the cool throws. That means it is important to wrestling in high school, wrestling in middle school, wrestling in the Summer, wrestling in college and wrestling internationally.  This absolutely exquisite throw in the blood round earned Lucas Byrd All American status: That middle panel shows that Lucas Byrd is the Michael Jackson of the Supplay. That's how you become the guy others refer to when they say, "Don't Greco a Greco Guy."  But how do you get confident enough to use such a tricky move like that in the Blood Round of the NCAA Tournament?  Here's how:   That's right! Learn from the guy who actually hit the throw in the NCAA Tournament! Also, learn from other guys who have made World teams and hit throws like that in competition. And don't forget the guru himself, Bryan Medlin.  And, while you

The ILLINI had another All American for the 30th year in a row. His name is Lucas Byrd, and he had the best takedown in the NCAA tournament. It went a little something like this: Earlier in the match, Lucas scored another takedown that raised a deep, philosophical question: Stand ups, sit outs and switches are for peasants!  Coach Mike Poeta letting his Italian show: Lucas will take on Austin DeSanto later this morning for the right to wrestle for third place. On the other side of the bracket, it is Michael McGee versus Korbin Myers. Earlier in the day, ILLINI big man Luuuke Luffman had a great time in his match until the Gothiest heavyweight I have ever seen threw in legs. Does he not know that's not allowed?  Zac Braunagel had the most excruciating bad luck to have a loss in sudden victory of the Blood Round. On the other hand, he can feel good about having wrestled the best and most entertaining match of the tournament: His win over Iowa State's Marcus Coleman in the second

FUTURE PATHS Coming out of day one, the ILLINI have one wrestler in the championship bracket and two left in consolation brackets. There are some winnable matches out there. Let's look at the future paths these ILLINOIS warriors might trod.  ZAC BRAUNAGEL .  He's still on the championship side of the bracket, and he's wrestled two fantastic matches to get there. The Brawlnagel is on a seven-match-winning streak during the B1G and NCAA Tournaments. His reward? An Olympic medalist in the NCAA quarterfinals. Myles Amine has lost two matches during the past two years. Both were to NCAA champions (Aaron Brooks this year at 184; AJ Ferrari last year at 197).  On wrestlestat.com, the algorithm predicts a 7-5 win for the #1 Wolverine over the #12 ILLINI. Against common opposition, Zac is 10-7, while Amine is 11-1. Against most of those people, the Michigan kid did substantially better than the ILLINOIS kid--besides beating more of them. The one shining hope is that Kaleb Romero has

HOW TO WATCH NCAA WRESTLING Anybody familiar with this blog knows that I live under an overpass in Myrtle Beach. Life is tough, and it doesn't get tougher than 8:00 pm behind the Starbucks. Talk about your blood round! I have to fight the Warlords and the 21st Avenue Orphans and all the individual homeless and drifters to get the day-olds. If I can walk out of that scrum with a bag of old Blueberry Muffins, it's like I'm an All-American that night.  Anyway, there is no cable and no satellite TV that runs under my overpass in Myrtle Beach, so I figured out what to do the street way. Sling TV is offering a free trial of their services, which includes access to ESPN3. You get all these other channels under the "Orange package," but I don't give a crap about that. I'm just after access to ESPN3 for three days.  I almost signed up yesterday, but just as I was about to click "submit," I noticed that the free trial would be over in two days. WTAF? That&

ILLINI NCAA WRESTLING HYPE VIDEO First of all, you really need to see this four minutes of fun that is the new ILLINI Wrestling NCAA Hype Video, done ala those Thug Life videos you used to love. Why haven't you watched it yet? Geez. Here you go: PHOTOSHOP BOO BOOS We've been much too serious in the NCAA Preview so far--I apologize--so let's lighten things up. I like to do photoshop stuff, but sometimes they don't turn out. When that happens, I just abandon the project. But some of that stuff still makes me laugh because it's so stupid. Here was one mistake I made while working on the Preview of the Boilermaker dual, attempting to turn Purdue Pete into Thanos: TRANSFER PORTAL NEWS! A big welcome to four-time Michigan state champion and former Cornhusker Kevon Davenport. He was wrestling at 149 for Nebraska, so I assume he will fight for the vacant spot in the starting lineup left by departing Seniors Christian Kanzler and Mike Carr. Davenport was the #22 overall recr

ILLINI WRESTLING NCAA HYPE VIDEO First of all, you really need to see this four minutes of fun that is the new ILLINI Wrestling NCAA Hype Video, done ala those Thug Life videos you used to love: Although Danny Braunagel wasn't selected as a wild card, he will remain in the video, as he deserved to be selected. Also, according to the Geneva Convention, it is a war crime to separate identical twins.  WHAT:   NCAA Wrestling Tournament WHERE:   Detroit, Michigan WHEN:   March 17-19, Starts at 11am (See Coverage below) TV/STREAMING:   ESPN, ESPNU, ESPN3 (See Coverage below) WHO:   Justin Cardani, Lucas Byrd, Zac Braunagel, Luke Luffman WHY:   To Kick Ass Nationally TIME CAPSULE It was March 19, 2017.  Ed Sheeran's Shape of You topped the Billboard charts, while Justin Timberlake was at #13 with Can't Stop the Feeling . If you weren't watching the NCAA Wrestling tournament, you might have been tuned into ABC's Time After Time , as Dr. John Stevenson (Jack the Ripper) met

This is--by far--my very favorite video ever created. I might do another one, this was so much fun. It is a four-minute ILLINI Wrestling NCAA Tournament hype video done in Thug Life mode. You remember those Thug Life videos, don't you? Well, dog, here you go: A couple of notes about the video: Danny Braunagel was actually very humble and self-deprecating in that interview. I stopped the video at precisely the right moment to make it seem that he was part of the Thug Life crowd. Here is the actual uncut video , with the portion excised starting at 2:14.  Speaking of Little Brawny, he's in the video because he deserves a Wild Card. Also, it is a well-known fact that you cannot separate identical twins according to Article Three, Section Nine of the Geneva Convention.  He belongs in the Big Dance.  Kudos to Trey Sizemore and Luke Luffman for the opening thumbnail frame. They deserve credit for that, which is still the funniest thing I've seen during the wrestling season.  The

THE LEG SWEEP AWARD The Leg Sweep Committee ("LSC") didn't see many leg or foot sweeps in the B1G Tournament, but, boy, did this one catch our eye. This was an old school Steve-Mocco-Style ankle pick using your foot to pick up the ankle.  Big Brawny used a throw-by to put Kaleb Romero off balance. Then, he hooked the ankle with his foot. The sequence did not end up scoring, as Romero is super-quick for the weight, but it was very close. It did put some fear in the Buckeye's mind. At the restart, his first move was backwards.  ZAC BRAUNAGEL  The ILLINI would lose his first match to Abe Assad of Iowa, then he would win five straight to earn third place. Maybe they'll spell his name right after this? Well, that never helped "Emory" Parker.  Whatever that move was he used to beat Nebraska's Taylor Venz in the consolation semifinals will have to go in this year's NCAA hype video.  LUCAS BYRD After an adrenaline-depleting last-second semifinal loss, Lu

Just a few thoughts because my brain is fried from watching so much wrestling. First, a graphic depiction of the state of the ILLINI squad starting day two: I've already been asked about Danny Braunagel's injury on twitter, and I know nothing about it. I thought I saw Trey Sizemore there at the arena, so it could be that the coaches considered inserting him in the lineup for the B1G Tournament, but then thought maybe the Brawlnagel would have the better shot at a wild card.  I just don't know.  Lucas Byrd was incredible! He wrestled like an All American with moxie. His next match will be against Rayvon Foley of MSU. After beating Foley, he'll beat either Ragusin or Cannon.  Luffman dropped a match earlier but came back with huge wins over Trent Hilger and Christian Lance. That's another AA he's beaten. He'll need to up his game against Mason Parris in his next match. Win, and he wrestles for third. Lose, and he likely faces Lucas Davison.  Zac Braunagel lost

My impression of the 1st session of the B1G wrestling tournament from an ILLINI perspective: