Last season, freshman Malik Heinselman found a way to fight through talented competition at the Big Ten Wrestling Championships and earn the final bid to the NCAA Championships. If he wants to repeat that feat, though, it will be a lot tougher this year.
Big Ten Wrestling Championships: 125 pounds
Basic Info:
Buckeye Wrestler: Malik Heinselman
Seed:No. 11
Place needed to qualify: 8th
That’s right. The Big Ten will have eight wrestlers in the NCAA Championships at 125 pounds. Last year that number was nine, but the conference is a drop weaker at that weight class in 2020. That means one fewer spot, which means it’s a tiny bit tougher for Heinselman to reach the NCAAs.
Paths to the NCAAs
Winner’s Bracket
The simplest path for Heinselman to guarantee himself a spot in the NCAA Championships would be to win his first two matches at the Big Ten Championships. As the No. 11 seed, Heinselman will face No. 6 seed Michael DeAugustino in the opening round. The two have faced off once in their career, a match that Heinselman won last year. However, DeAugustino has been much better in 2020 than he was in 2019, and unfortunately Heinselman has not quite been as good this year as last year.
If Heinselman wins that match, he will face either No. 3 seed Patrick McKee of Minnesota or No. 14 seed Brandon Meredith of Penn State. Heinselman is 1-1 vs McKee in his career, but the win also came last season, while he lost a 5-1 decision to McKee back in January. Heinselman is 1-0 against Meredith in his career, winning a 5-3 decision at last month’s dual match against Penn State.
Consolation Bracket
What’s Heinselman’s path if he can’t win his first two matches? Well, there are two possibilities.
First, let’s start with what happens if Heinselman upsets DeAugustino, but he then falls to McKee. In that case, he would most likely face Michigan State’s Logan Griffin or Maryland’s Brandon Cray in his first consolation match. Heinselman has never faced Griffin and is 1-0 against Cray (last month), and a win in that match would lock Heinselman into the top eight and NCAA qualifying position. (If, however, Griffin and/or Cray pulls off a first-round upset, Heinselman could meet either No. 5 seed Jack Medley of Michigan or No. 4 seed Justin Cardini of Illinois. Heinselman is actually 4-0 in his career against Medley and 1-1 against Cardini, though the win over Cardini came last year.) All in all, Heinselman should be confident in his shot to reach the NCAAs if he can upset DeAugustino.
But what if Heinselman can’t? If he falls to DeAugustino in his opening match, the path is much tougher. Heinselman would immediately fall to the consolation bracket, where he would face the loser of the McKee-Meredith match. If he wins that match, the sophomore would then have to face the loser of the second-round match involving the Cardini-Cray and Griffin-Medley group. Based on history, Heinselman should have a real shot if Medley is the opponent there, but it’s not a very comfortable path towards qualification. Then again, Heinselman got through tougher last year, so there’s some definite hope if he finds his 2019 form again. And, all in all, he’s avoiding some of his even tougher potential matchups.