This has been a rough season for the Gophers in wrestling and the seeds for the Big Ten meet on Saturday and Sunday at Williams Arena reflect that.

Jayson Ness (left) is the only Gopher who is a top seed. He is a no-brainer. The sophomore from Bloomington Kennedy is a defending champion, is 33-0 and has 18 pins. He had the most pins in the nation of any wrestler most of the season and probably still does.

But the most experienced team in the conference, the two-time defending Big Ten champions, the defending national champion and the unanimous preseason No. 1 have nobody else seeded higher than third.

Here is a look at the seeding at every weight:

125 pounds: Ness. … Iowa’s Charlie Falck, who wrestled at Apple Valley, is seeded second.

133: James Kennedy (25-4) of Illinois is the top seed. … Senior Mack Reiter of the U is seeded fifth out of eight wrestlers seeded at every weight.

141: Kellen Russell (26-5) of Michigan is the top seed. … Gophers senior Manuel Rivera is seeded sixth.

149: Brent Metcalf (30-1) of Iowa is the top seed, Joshua Churella of Michigan is seeded second, and Dustin Schlatter of the Gophers third. … Metcalf is 30-1 for the Hawkeyes, the Big Ten regular-season champions and the No. 1-rated team nationally. … Schlatter is the defending conference champion.

157: Michael Poeta (26-2) of Illinois is the top seed. … C.P. Schlatter, Dustin’s brother, is seeded fourth and is the defending conference champion.

165: Mark Perry (18-2) of Iowa is the top seed. … Tyler Safratowich of the Gophers is seeded third. … Perry is the defending champion and rated No. 1 in the nation at his weight.

174: Steve Luke (27-3) of Michigan is the top seed. … Gabe Drestch of the Gophers is the third seed.

184: Mike Pucillo (25-1) of Ohio State is the top seed. … Senior Roger Kish of the Gophers is seeded fourth.

197: Mike Tamillow (27-2) of Northwestern is the top seed. … Justin Bronson of the Gophers is seeded sixth. … Tamillow is a defending conference champion. 

Hwt: J.D. Bergman (27-1) of Ohio State is the top seed. …. Ben Berhow of the Gophers is seeded eighth.

The seeds were based on a vote of the conference’s head coaches. Four teams had two No. 1 seeds: Illinois, Iowa, Michigan and Ohio State. The Buckeyes finished second in the conference behind Iowa.

Last year the Gophers had four individual champions — three are back, heavyweight Cole Konrad graduated — and ran away with the Big Ten title with 156 points. Wisconsin was second with 100.5, third was Iowa with 91, closely followed by Penn State (90.5) and Indiana (85).

How many Gophers will win Big Ten titles this year? And who will it be? Matching last year’s total of four could be difficult.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 at 1:13 am and is filed under Gophers wrestling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.