Husker wrestlers brace for Oklahoma State<\/p>\n
BY CRAIG SESKER<\/p>\n
NCAA Wrestling<\/p>\n
LINCOLN – You can’t buy much for a buck these days.<\/p>\n
A bottle of pop. Half a gallon of gas.<\/p>\n
But Thursday night at the NU Coliseum, a $1 ticket will gain you admittance to No. 6 Nebraska’s biggest wrestling dual of the season.<\/p>\n
Coach Mark Manning is hoping to pack the Coliseum when his Huskers (16-1-1) face two-time defending national champion and No. 1 Oklahoma State (17-0) in a Big 12 dual. The meet is set for 7 p.m.<\/p>\n
The Cowboys – led by national champions Chris Pendleton (174), Jake Rosholt (197) and Steve Mocco (heavyweight) – are favored in 6 of 10 classes.<\/p>\n
“This is going to be a really exciting meet, “Manning said. “I think a big crowd can make a huge difference. Our guys are going to feed off it. If we can pack the Coliseum with 5,000 fans, and get the place rocking, it could be monumental for us.”<\/p>\n
Manning said he is hoping a boisterous crowd can boost his team through the tough bouts.<\/p>\n
“We want to make it a brawl, “Manning said. “We want to make it a little bit of a street fight.”<\/p>\n
Nebraska wrestlers are excited about facing the nation’s best in front of a large crowd.<\/p>\n
“I think that home crowd will be a big factor, “NU’s Matt Murray said. “It can get really loud in there. It gets your emotions and your adrenaline going.”<\/p>\n
Nebraska has dropped the last 10 duals with OSU. NU has not defeated the Cowboys in Lincoln since the 1921-22 season.<\/p>\n
The Huskers have not defeated Oklahoma State since earning a 39-12 road win in 1993.<\/p>\n
A pivotal match may come at 165 pounds when All-Americans Jacob Klein of Nebraska and Johny Hendricks of Oklahoma State meet. Klein is ranked eighth while Hendricks is ranked second. They have never met.<\/p>\n
“That match could go a long way toward deciding this dual, “Manning said.<\/p>\n
At 125, NU’s eighth-ranked Matt Keller faces talented true freshman Coleman Scott.<\/p>\n
“Our team isn’t intimidated by anybody, “Keller said. “I think we are going to surprise a lot of people.”<\/p>\n
At 197, Rosholt will battle No. 10 B.J. Padden of Nebraska.<\/p>\n
The Cowboys feature two of the nation’s most dominant wrestlers in Pendleton and Mocco, guys expected to contend for spots on the 2008 Olympic team.<\/p>\n
Pendleton, a senior, won the national title at 174 last year.<\/p>\n
Mocco, a junior, won a national title two years ago at Iowa. He took an Olympic redshirt last year, finishing third at the Olympic Trials. He then transferred to Oklahoma State.<\/p>\n
OSU’s Zack Esposito is ranked second at 149.<\/p>\n
Nebraska’s Travis Pascoe (21-1) is ranked second at 184. Pascoe has won 20 straight.<\/p>\n
“Any team can beat at any time, “Pascoe said. “Winning this dual would be huge for our confidence heading into this last part of the season.”<\/p>\n
NU’s Pascoe, Keller, Matt Murray (141) and B.J. Wright (157) are favored.<\/p>\n
“We need to go for the bonus points and go for the fall, “Manning said. “And we can’t give up any bonus points.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Husker wrestlers brace for Oklahoma State BY CRAIG SESKER NCAA Wrestling LINCOLN – You can’t buy much for a buck these days. A bottle of pop. Half a gallon of gas. But Thursday night at the NU Coliseum, a $1 ticket will gain you admittance to No. 6 Nebraska’s biggest wrestling dual of the season. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wrestling"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":6}},"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2B7Di-aC","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrestlingpod.com\/wrestling-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}