CMU Wrestlers Face Big-Time Test
12/31/2015 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling
Southern Scuffle: Pre-Seeds | Brackets
Andy Sneddon, CMUChippeaws.com
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. - It's been a good start to the 2015-16 season for the Central Michigan wrestling team.
When the calendar flips to 2016 on Friday, the Chippewas will start to find out just how good they are, and how good they may be.
CMU will step on the mat with some of the very best in college wrestling in the Southern Scuffle at Chattanooga. The two-day tournament gets under way Friday and concludes on Saturday.
The field features 30 teams, 10 of which are ranked in the USA Today/National Wrestling Coaches Association Top 25 poll.
No. 1 Penn State headlines the field, along with third-ranked North Carolina State, No. 5 Virginia Tech, No. 7 Oklahoma State and No. 10 Lehigh. The Chippewas are ranked 16th.
"In my mind this is probably the best tournament of the year other than the NCAA Championships," CMU coach Tom Borrelli said. "You look at the seeds and where they're ranked this year and what they've done in the past. It doesn't get much better than this."
The field also includes Michigan, Cornell, North Carolina and Virginia, who are ranked 13th, 14th, 15th and 17th, respectively.
Individually, the tournament comprises two defending national champions and 30 wrestlers who earned All-America honors in 2015.
Two Chippewas, Zach Horan (141 pounds) and Colin Heffernan (149), reached the podium at last year's Southern Scuffle. Horan was fourth, Heffernan eighth.
Lucas Smith (157) is the highest-ranked Chippewa (eighth) in the Amateur Wrestling News rankings. Heffernan is 10th, Mike Ottinger (174) is 12th, Horan is 18th, Austin Severn (184) is 19th, and Cory Keener (133) is 20th.
The Chippewas are 4-0 in dual meets and placed second two weeks ago at the Reno Tournament of Champions.
After the Southern Scuffle, CMU wrestles three straight home duals, the first against Oregon State on Saturday, Jan. 9, followed by a Mid-American Conference showdowns with Ohio on Jan. 10 and with three-time defending league champion Missouri on Jan. 17.
Missouri is ranked fourth, Ohio 21st, and Oregon State is among others receiving votes in the national poll.
After those three duals, the Chippewas close the month of January with duals at Michigan, Northern Iowa and Iowa State.
"Our thing is we want to start gaining confidence," Borrelli said. "I think we are. We want to continue going down that path, continue being consistent. We know this is going to be a very telling month for us.
"Be ourselves and be consistent. When we're ourselves we can perform well and we'll find out this weekend how good we are. We can't get too high or too low on anything that happens this month. It's going to be a grind."
Players Mentioned
