WIAC Preview
Please Note: These are predictions of what will happen at a specific tournament on a specific date. They are not seedings or rankings. We have seen all the results and made predictions based off those results. We may predict someone to win, even if they recently lost to a conference opponent, but that does not mean we did not see the results.
All week long, d3wrestle.com will be publishing previews of each of the NCAA qualifying tournaments to be held this weekend. In addition to predicting winners and identifying the top athletes at each weight, we will attempt to predict all 160 qualifiers based on the number of wildcards available for each qualifying tournament. With nine qualifiers, d3wrestle.com will publish two each day, with the last one appearing Friday morning.
Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference – 19 qualifiers
Predicted Team Champion: UW-Whitewater
Top Individual: Austin Bautista, UW-Whitewater
Returning NCAA Qualifiers: Austin Bautista (UW-Whitewater 141, 7th NCAA), Chase DeCleene (UW-Stevens Point 141), Matt Mauseth (UW-La Crosse 149, 6th NCAA), Jesse Milks (UW-Platteville 157, 6th NCAA), Ryan Higgins (UW-Platteville 165); Jason Wozniak (UW-Stevens Point 165), Patrick Nagel (UW-Whitewater 165); Ben Engelland (UW-Stevens Point 184); Joshua Zabel (UW-La Crosse 184, 5th NCAA); Josh Holforty (UW-Eau Claire 197, 6th NCAA), Dan Laurent (UW-La Crosse 285, 1st NCAA)
Whitewater has come on strong in the WIAC and has taken the top spot away from La Crosse. Led by wire to wire #1 Austin Bautista, the Warhawks will bring a strong team into the qualifier. The top returner from last year is NCAA champ Dan Laurent of La Crosse, but he has stumbled a bit this year. We are predicting Sam Laes to unfortunately be the last NCAA qualifier from Lawrence, but he will have to wrestle well to earn that spot. This is a conference that could take a few third place winners in some weights while leaving runners-up in other weights at home. They will likely need another good performance to maintain their 19 qualifiers for next year
Weight by Weight (predicted qualifiers in bold)
125 Prediction: Max Oldenburg, UW-Whitewater
Top Challenger: Lloyd McKinney, UW-La Crosse
133 Prediction: Jered Kern, UW-Stevens Point
Top Challengers: Andy Miller, UW-Eau Claire; Bebeto Yewah, UW-La Crosse
141 Prediction: Austin Bautista, UW-Whitewater
Top Challengers: Chase DeCleene, UW-Stevens Point; Alex Dahl, UW-La Crosse
149 Prediction: Matt Mauseth, UW-La Crosse
Top Challengers: Kris Magruder, UW-Stevens Point; Andrew Johnston, UW-Eau Claire
157 Prediction: Jesse Milks, UW-Platteville
Top Challenger: Thomas Trieloff, UW-Whitewater
165 Prediction: Jason Wozniak, UW-Stevens Point
Top Challengers: Patrick Nagel, UW-Whitewater; Ryan Higgins, UW-Platteville; Cory Ferguson, UW-La Crosse
174 Prediction: Michael Schmitz, UW-La Crosse
Top Challengers: Carsten Carlsen, UW-Platteville; Dennis Reckelberg, UW-Stevens Point
184 Prediction: Joshua Zabel, UW-La Crosse
Top Challengers: Ben Engelland, UW-Stevens Point; Sam Laes, Lawrence; David Casper, UW-Whitewater; Brad Zellner, UW-Platteville
197 Prediction: Karl Voeck, UW-Whitewater
Top Challengers: Andy Moore, UW-La Crosse; Josh Holforty, UW-Eau Claire; Jeremey Fulk, UW-Stevens Point
285 Prediction: Dan Laurent, UW-La Crosse
Top Challengers: Jon Schmidt, UW-Whitewater; Chad Gregory, UW-Stevens Point