LARAMIE, Wyo. (Dec. 18, 2018) – The 18th-ranked Wyoming wrestling team travels to Reno, Nev., this week to compete in its final regular-season tournament at the Reno Tournament of Champions on Thursday at 10 a.m. MT.
In the Lineup
Along with a number of Pokes set to compete unattached, a slew of Cowboys will be making the trip to Reno to compete at the event, including:
125:
Cole Verner
133:
Mark McConnell
141:
Sam Turner
149:
Jaron Jensen
157:
Dewey Krueger
174:
Hayden Hastings,
Casey Randles,
Anthony Lombardo
184:
Carless Looney
197:
Cale Davidson
HWT:
Brian Andrews
Tournament Coverage
Fans can stream all of the action this weekend live on FloWrestling. Live scoring and brackets will be available on FloArena. Fans can also follow live updates on Twitter at @WyoWrestle.
From Coach Branch
"It's a one-day tournament, so it's not a great replication of what we'll see in the postseason. It's still a good experience for our guys because it will be a long day with a lot of matches and you don't get that very often. It be a great test for our guys."
"I think Oklahoma State is bringing their starting team, and we've already seen them but they haven't had their starting team there for quite a few years. That will definitely increase the toughness of the field. It's all about the matches and experience. We're actually going to keep a couple of our more experienced guys home—Branson (Ashworth) and Montorie (Bridges). They're on pace to get, probably, too many matches for guys that know what they're doing. We're going to use this for our young guys to continue to hone what they're doing and make improvements."
Last Time Out
The Cowboys (3-2, 1-1 Big 12) are coming off picking up their first Big 12 win earlier this month in the Arena-Auditorium, overwhelming No. 19 North Dakota State, 29-6. Pokes took eight of the 10 bouts from the Bison, including bonus point wins from
Montorie Bridges,
Dewey Krueger and
Carless Looney.
Tournament Field
Aside from the Cowboys, the 2018 Reno Tournament of Champions field features teams from all different levels of college wrestling, including DI foes No. 3 Oklahoma State, No. 10 Arizona State, Cal Poly, Michigan State and The Citadel.
Last Time in Reno…
Thanks to five top-three finishes, the Wyoming wrestling program took second place at the Reno Tournament of Champions last season.
Senior
Bryce Meredith (141 pounds), junior
Branson Ashworth (165 pounds) and redshirt freshman
Montorie Bridges (133 pounds) led the Pokes with first-place finishes at their respective weights, while seniors
Archie Colgan (157 pounds) and
Chaz Polson (184 pounds) took third for the Brown and Gold. UW racked up 140 points to finish behind No. 6 North Carolina State (192 points) in the team standings. Of Wyoming's 19 wrestlers that competed on Sunday, 14 recorded a bonus-point victory in their opening round match.
Wyoming has finished in the top four at the event each of the last three years.
