Full Results Below

DeKALB, Ill. – The Northern Illinois University wrestling team dropped its Mid-American Conference opener on Thursday night, falling to No. 19 Central Michigan 39-3 at the NIU Convocation Center.

Shawn Scott (Holly, Mich./Holly) picked up the only win of the night for the Huskies (2-3, 0-1 MAC) against a deep squad from the nationally ranked Chippewas (3-0, 1-0 MAC). Scott, ranked No. 16 nationally at 197 pounds, defeated Jackson Lewis by a 5-3 decision for his 10th win of the season.

NIU wrestling head coach Ryan Ludwig said his team was “disappointed” with the overall result, but he highlighted Scott’s performance and some strong starts in other matches as positives for the Huskies.

“It was good the way Shawn came from behind to win his match by scoring late and staying active until the very end,” Ludwig said of Scott. “Overall, we didn’t wrestle poorly tonight. The effort was there. We enjoy wrestling the very best and having teams like this on our schedule. But against a very talented Central Michigan team, some bad moments swung a few bouts against us after we had given ourselves a chance to win.”

One of those momentum swings occurred in the only ranked matchup of the night as No. 14 Zach Horan of Central Michigan took on No. 15 Steve Bleise (Chelsea, Mich./Chelsea) of the Huskies at 141 pounds. Bleise started well, got the first takedown and appeared to be in control of the match against the defending MAC champion in his weight class. But Horan took advantage of a scramble to get Bleise on his back and record a pin late in the first period that made the team score 13-0 in favor of the Chippewas.

Several other scrambles throughout the night went Central Michigan’s way as the visitors recorded seven consecutive bonus-point decisions to build their lead before Scott put points on the board for NIU in front of a healthy crowd in the team's only dual at the Convo this season.

The NIU wrestling team will have next week off for finals before the Huskies resume their schedule with a road trip to Phoenix, Ariz., to take on Grand Canyon in a non-conference dual matchup on Dec. 19 at 2 p.m. CT.

Full Results

125: Brent Fleetwood (CMU) dec. Alijah Jeffery (NIU), 6-1
133: Corey Keener (CMU) maj. dec. Austin Eicher (NIU), 11-3
141: No. 14 Zach Horan (CMU) pins No. 15 Steve Bleise (NIU), 2:04
149: No. 9 Colin Heffernan (CMU) tech. fall Chris Garcia (NIU), 21-4, 6:38
157: No. 10 Lucas Smith (CMU) pins Austin Culton (NIU), 5:34
165: Jordan Wohlfert (CMU) maj. dec. Andrew Scott (NIU), 13-4
174: No. 10 Michael Ottinger (CMU) maj. dec. Trace Engelkes (NIU), 12-3
184: Jordan Ellingwood (CMU) maj. dec. Quinton Rosser (NIU), 10-2
197: No. 16 Shawn Scott (NIU) dec. Jackson Lewis (CMU), 5-3
285: Newton Smerchek (CMU) dec. Arthur Bunce (NIU), 2-1

--NIU--