Who: # Iowa State vs. West Virginia
Date: Saturday February 7th, 2015
Time: 5:00 PM – Central
Location: Morgantown, West Virginia
#8 Iowa State Cyclones 7-2 (1-1)
125- Kyle Larson
133- #4 Earl Hall
141- Dante Rodriguez or John Meeks
149- #14 Gabe Moreno
157- Luke Goettl
165- #4 Mike Moreno
174- #11 Tanner Weatherman
184- #15 Lelund Weatherspoon
197- #2 Kyven Gadson
285- Quean Smith
West Virginia Mountaineers 6-7* (0-2)
125- Zeke Moisey
133- Cory Stainbrook
141- #13 Michael Morales
149- Louis Colonna
157- Tim Wheeling
165- Ross Renzi
174- Parker VanEgidy
184- Bubba Scheffel
197- Jake Smith
285- AJ Vizcarrondo
*WV will face Clarion the day before they face ISU
The Cyclones will look to move to 2-1 in Big 12 conference duals on their final road trip of the season (before NCAAs at least) against West Virginia who has had some mixed results to this point and they will look to get back to .500 in duals when they host Clarion the day before they wrestle Iowa State. The Mountaineers only top 25 dual win this year was against #25 Bucknell at the Virginia Duals, and taking on a top 10 team will be a large task for them to get their first Big 12 dual victory. So far West Virginia has only won five of their 20 individual Big 12 dual matches, with 197 Jake Smith the only Mountaineer 2-0 in conference duals.
125 should hold promise to be a pretty good matchup with Kyle Larson and true freshman Zeke Moisey. Moisey is 1-1 in Big 12 action with his lone win coming against Ryan Milhoff of Oklahoma, who took out Larson this past weekend 3-2. Sammie Henson’s decision to pull Moisey’s redshirt was made pretty early in the year, and it’s mostly paid off with him flirting in and out of the top 20. West Virginia should be favored in this match, but Larson is an upset waiting to happen.
All-American Earl Hall might be having the best season for a Cyclone, and when you have Kyven Gadson on your team, that’s saying something. His opponent at 133 will be Cory Stainbrook, who also is up from 125 a year ago. Last year the pair split, with Hall winning the first meeting 11-8, and Stainbrook getting revenge at the conference tournament 5-4. What’s different from last year to this year is Earl Hall’s body seems to approve of the weight jump, and he has four top ten wins in 2015.
John Meeks put together a great weekend taking second (141) at the Grand View open, his teammate Dante Rodriguez also had a good weekend with his major decision victory over Oklahoma’s Trae Blackwell. I think Rodriguez gets the nod again this weekend as he will look to score an upset over #13 ranked Michael Morales. A win over Morales would provide a nice boost for Rodriguez’s (or Meeks’s) post season resume.
At 149 Gabe Moreno will look to remain perfect in conference duals against unranked Louis Colonna. The younger Moreno has five losses on the season, with four of them coming to top 15 opponents (the other loss was to Pitt’s Edgar Bright, who was a top 15 wrestlers at 141 a year ago).
Luke Goettl will look for his first confernce dual win against Tim Wheeling at 157 after dropping matches to two ranked foes. Goettl’s major decision against Virginia Tech’s Jake Spengler was huge in Iowa State’s upset and with the Big 12 conference tournament not a NCAA qualifing tournament, Goettl could use another win over a DI wrestler.
Ross Renzi will probably provide a close match with All-American Mike Moreno at 165, with Moreno winning a previous meeting 4-0 at Cliff-Keen Las Vegas. One thing Renzi has proven to this point in the season is that he does a fairly good job at keeping matches close with good wrestlers.
The Cyclones upperweights should continue to be the favorites with #11Tanner Weatherman (174), #15 Lelund Weatherspoon (184), and #2 Kyven Gadson (197) taking the mat. 184 should be a good matchup between Weatherspoon and Scheffel, last year Scheffel wrestled 174 and Tanner Weatherman won the only meeting 9-4. Weatherman will be looking to get back on track after his upset in Oklahoma this past weekend, and Gadson will try and continue his hot streak with a four match winning streak, all of them coming by way of bonus.
The final match will be between Quean Smith and AJ Vizcarrondo, who is currently riding a five match slide. The pair have three common opponents, with neither of wrestlers getting a win. Wrestle Stats has Smith favored in this match, so I think he will be the heavyweight getting his first conference win this weekend.