This Week in Peacock Wrestling... No. 22 Upper Iowa is back on the mat in Dorman Gym on Thursday and Sunday this week to close out their regular season schedule. The Peacocks will host the No. 1 Huskies of St. Cloud State University and the No. 25 Wolves of Northern State University in the two duals. Thursday's dual begins at 7 p.m., while Sunday's dual will mark this season's Mike Olson Alumni Dual and will start at 2 p.m.
 
Live Options… Fans unable to attend can follow the live results or watch a webcast through the links above or at UIUPeacocks.com/Live. The dual will also stream live on the NSIC Channel on all Roku and Amazon Fire devices, as well as Apple and Android televisions and broadcast live on KCRG-TV 9.3.
 
UIU in Duals this season… The Peacocks are 7-5 in duals and 4-2 against NSIC opponents this year coming off a solid 28-7 victory over the No. 20 Marauders of the University of Mary. Prior to the win last Friday, UIU posted a split on the road with Minnesota State University Moorhead (W, 18-15) and Augustana University (L, 16-15). Both opponents were receiving votes in the last NWCA Division II Top 25. Before the split with MSU Moorhead and Augustana, UIU posted a narrow loss, 18-17, to No. 9 Minnesota State University, Mankato and a 25-8 victory over Southwest Minnesota State University (RV). Upper Iowa earned an eighth place finish at the NWCA National Duals in Louisville, Kentucky to begin 2019. At the National Duals, Upper Iowa defeated West Liberty University (36-12) and Gannon University (24-12) around a loss (27-12) to No. 2 St. Cloud State University to earn their place on day two. UIU fell to No. 8 Lindenwood University (26-21) and the No. 13 University of Central Oklahoma (24-12) to close out their time in Louisville. . UIU opened the season with wins over Truman State University (56-0) and Minot State University (33-11).
 
NCAA Leaders…  The NCAA has released an update to the standings for the 2019 NCAA Wrestling Awards that will be awarded in March at the respective Division I, II and III Wrestling Championships. For falls and tech falls to be counted they must come against opponents in the same division (i.e. Division II vs. Division II). Ties in the two categories are broken based on the aggregate time. Evan Loughman of Lake Erie University leads NCAA Division II in falls with 11, while UIU's Justin Folley is tied for fourth with 8 falls and SCSU's Zach Muller and Vince Dietz are both tied for seventh with 7. The NCAA's first ranking for the Most Dominant award came out this week and SCSU's Dietz is ranked first with an average of 4.74 team points per match, while teammate Kolton Eischens is sixth with 3.88 team points per match.
 
Peacocks in the Rankings… Upper Iowa is ranked No. 22 in the country in the latest national poll based on a Tournament Point Index and No. 15 in the country based on Team Duals. The NWCA Division II Team Dual Top 25 is a new poll just released by the Division II rankings committee. Individually, the Peacocks boast four wrestlers in the rankings. Justin Folley is ranked No. 6 in the country at 133 pounds. Brock Benitz is ranked No. 10 in the nation at 165 pounds. Dalton Hahn is ranked No. 10 in the country at 184 pounds, while Nick Baumler rounds out the nationally-ranked group at No. 9 in the 197-pound weight class.
 
Scouting the No. 1 Huskies… The St. Cloud State wrestling team received a No. 1 ranking in both the Tournament and Dual meet NWCA Division II polls, which were released on Feb. 4.  In the dual rankings, SCSU posted 150 points with its 17-0 record. Individually, SCSU had wrestlers ranked in all 10 weight brackets in the last poll.  At 125-pounds, Brett Velasquez was ranked second and Garrett Vos was ranked 11th at 133-pounds.  At 141-pounds, Garrett Aldrich was ranked seventh and James Pleski moved up to the No. 2 spot at 149-pounds.  At 157-pounds, SCSU's Jake Barzowski was ranked sixth and Devin FitzPatrick was ranked 11th at 165.  At 174-pounds, SCSU's Kolton Eischens was ranked second and Chance Helmick moved into the polls with a No. 4 ranking at 184 this week.  At 197-pounds, Vince Dietz maintained his No. 1 ranking at 197-pounds.  At 285-pounds, Zach Muller returned to the top 12 with a No. 11 ranking in the latest poll for the Huskies. SCSU improved to 17-0, 5-0 NSIC with a 32-6 victory at Minnesota State, Moorhead on Jan. 31.  Travis Swanson gained a pin against MSUM's Mason Schulz at 1:12 to pace the Huskies in the victory. The Huskies have now won 45 consecutive dual matches dating back to Jan. 14, 2017.   The Huskies have also won 58 consecutive NSIC dual matches dating back to an 18-13 loss to Augustana on Jan. 27, 2011.  Since that loss, SCSU has won seven consecutive NSIC titles.
 
Scouting the No. 25 Wolves… The Wolves come into the weekend with a 6-4 dual mark on the season and a 3-4 record in the Northern Sun. The team is coming off a 25-20 loss at home to Minot State University. Earlier in the season, Northern State posted wins over U-Mary, 24-12, Augustana, 21-13, and Southwest Minnesota State, 22-16. But injuries have slowed the Wolves' run toward the postseason. The team is led by 149-pounder Caden Moore, who is ranked No. 7 in the nation. Moore is 20-5 with six bonus-point wins including a tech fall and 5 majors.
 

No. 22 Peacocks		W	L	F	TF	MD
125	Maleek Williams	17	9	7	2	6
133	#6 Justin Folley	25	6	1	4	7
133	Jared Hensley	7	7	1	2	1
141	Ryan Schmalen	9	14	0	0	8
149	Ryan Steffen	8	15	0	1	3
157	Tucker Black	14	8	2	4	2
157	Mac Spotts	12	12	1	3	3
165	#10 Brock Benitz	12	4	0	2	4
165	Cody Nelson	6	5	0	0	2
174	Jordan Gundrum	19	11	3	1	2
184	#11 Dalton Hahn	26	7	0	3	11
184	Connor Williams	23	9	1	0	10
197	#10 Nick Baumler	18	5	1	4	8
285	Triston Westerlund	11	3	0	0	3
285	Bodie Garnier	5	7	0	0	1
No. 1 Huskies		W	L	F	TF	MD
125	#2 Brett Velasquez	14	2	3	3	2
133	Brandon Briggs	8	9	1	0	2
133	#11 Garrett Vos	12	1	3	0	3
141	#7 Garrett Aldrich	7	2	2	1	0
141	Travis Swanson	19	4	6	6	1
149	#2 James Pleski	19	1	3	1	3
157	#6 Jake Barzowski	9	4	1	2	5
165	#11 Devin FitzPatrick	19	2	7	3	2
174	#2 Kolton Eischens	18	1	6	3	2
184	#4 Chance Helmick	8	0	1	1	5
197	#1 Vince Dietz	22	0	8	1	4
285	#11 Zach Muller	17	4	9	0	1
285	Noah Ryan	14	3	1	2	2
No. 25 Wolves		W	L	F	TF	MD
125	Dayne Morton	12	5	2	0	1
133	Kenny Jones	3	2	0	1	1
141	Nate Rodriguez	5	5	2	0	0
141	Robert Coyle	6	8	0	1	1
149	#7 Caden Moore	20	5	0	1	5
157	Walker Carr	14	10	4	1	1
165	Billy Holtan	13	10	2	2	0
174	Tanner Wiese	13	10	5	0	0
174	Hudson Pearman	7	7	2	0	0
184	Kaden Campbell	14	6	7	3	1
197	Diego Gallegos	14	9	1	1	0
285	Harrison Townsend	8	5	1	0	0