Wrestling | February 11

DeKALB, Ill. – Behind a crowd of over 500 fans, the Northern Illinois University wrestling team (7-5, 4-1 MAC) welcomed No. 13 Northwestern to the main floor of the Convocation Center for a prime time dual. It was a hard-fought match, but it was the Wildcats who emerged victorious 30-6.   

"We knew what this was. We invited those guys down here for a battle, and that's what it was," said head NIU coach Ryan Ludwig.

Starting things out with a bang, Blake West had the crowd on its feet for the opening bout at 125. The Huskie redshirt freshman tangled No. 8 Michael DeAugustino to overtime before earning a 7-2 win in tiebreaker II. The victory marked his fifth-straight win.

"What a way to start off the night with a signature win for Blake West. That has a lot of implications for him in terms of bringing in an automatic qualifying spot to our conference, getting him into the national rankings where we think he belongs, and just setting forth a lot of momentum. So that was an incredible win, not only for him, but for the team moving forward,"

No. 14 Izzak Olejnik was the other Huskie to record a win tonight as the redshirt senior edged No. 18 Maxx Mayfield 5-4, his fourth-straight triumph.

"We knew it was going to be a battle. The kid's [Olejnik] tough. He's been on the come up all year. Izzak's showing maturity, showing composure, winning that tight battle to help him grab another nationally-ranked win to help him with MAC seeding and national seeding,"

Although those would be the only Huskie hands raised through the evening, coach Ludwig was proud of the effort and grit his team showed against a stout Northwestern (6-3, 4-3 Big Ten) team that had nine rankings in its lineup.

"I'm proud of our effort, despite the team score. Obviously we want to win the dual outright, but kudos to Northwestern, they wrestled a heck of a dual meet and they won some of those tight battles,"

It was an especially unique evening as, prior to the dual, the wrestling program recognized and honored its four departing seniors: Anthony Gibson, Anthony Cheloni, Bryce West and Terrese Aaron.

"I would just like to express for myself and my coaching staff, just incredible gratitude for the five years, six years these guys have put in for us. They've been through it all with us and we've got nothing but love and gratitude for those guys,"

The Huskies return to the mat next Sunday (Feb. 19) for the regular season finale against SIUE (4-7, 1-6 MAC). The road dual will start at 1 p.m. and air on ESPN+.

"We have to stay motivated. We have to keep getting better like we have been every week. We have to keep gaining steam and understand that every situation, every position we put ourselves in, every chance we give ourselves to get our hand raised, will help us ultimately at the MAC Championship and then furthermore to get to the NCAAs, is which is our ultimate goal."