#8 Mizzou (#16 Little Rock, #25 Purdue, #29 Maryland, Cal Poly, SIUE)
The Tigers hosted their third annual Tiger Style Invite at Staley High School over the weekend and came away with four champs. They won with 168.5 points, 25 more than second place Purdue. No team had their full lineups in, so team wise it doesn’t change too much. There were still ranked matches to be found though, and Mizzou managed to find some upsets. It was a solid performance from the starters, and some young wrestlers had solid results as well before a big dual with Virginia Tech coming up.
125lbs: Gage Walker (3rd, 3-1), Luqman Masud (6th, 3-2), Mack Mauger (DNP, 1-2)
- Finals: #4 Matt Ramos (PUR) Tech Koda Holeman (CP) (5:09 (19-1))
- 3rd Place: Gage Walker (MIZ) Dec. Davian Guanajuato (SIUE) (1-0)
- 5th Place Match: Isaiah Quintero (PUR) Fall Luqman Masud (MIZ) (1:47)
No Noah Surtin here, and that will continue to be an injury to monitor. Gage Walker started his day well with a tech, but struggled to find his offense in the semis against Koda Holeman. Walker won two more matches to finish his tournament with a 2-1 decision and the 1-0 for third. Being able to win these tight matches is a good skill, but Walker’s offense has been noticeably absent in matches compared to the Black and Gold dual.
Luqman Masud had wild matches throughout the tournament, putting up double digit points in three consecutive matches. He’s willing to create and enter big scrambles, and showed a tendency to build a big lead before his opponents coming back.
Mack Mauger had a solid 11-0 major to start his day before running into top seed Matt Ramos, who teched his way through the tournament. From there Mauger ran into Quintero, who went 1-2 against Mizzou wrestlers on the day. I’m still high on Mauger, but he struggled to find his offense in matches here.
133lbs: Jake Crapps (3rd, 3-1), #29 Kade Moore (4th, 2-2), Trey Crawford (5th, 2-2)
- Finals: #20 Zeth Romney (CP) Dec. #12 Braxton Brown (MARY) (10-3)
- 3rd Place: Jake Crapps (MIZ) over #29 Kade Moore (MIZ) (MFFL)
- 5th Place: Trey Crawford (MIZ) over Marcel Lopez (SIUE) (MFFL)
I was excited for Kade Moore’s opportunity here as I again thought he could score an upset somewhere. Unfortunately he ran into a much improved Zeth Romney, who’s final performance was eye opening against a very solid Brown.