University of Minnesota Athletics
Minnesota Wraps Up Big Ten Season Sunday
2/7/2015 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling
Feb. 7, 2015
Now 10 weeks removed from its Big Ten conference-opener, No. 2 Minnesota will visit College Park on Sunday to take on Maryland and wrap up its 2014-15 Big Ten schedule. The dual will be the first-ever conference match between the Gophers (10-2 overall, 6-2 Big Ten) and the Terrapins (5-13 overall, 0-7 Big Ten).
After winning its first 10 duals this season, Minnesota has dropped its last two contests, most recently falling to No. 5 Ohio State in Columbus on Friday night, 22-13. Prior to its recent skid, Minnesota had racked up six victories over ranked teams, and a seventh over Wyoming, which was not ranked back in November when the teams met but is ranked today. Maryland will be the first - and only - unranked opponent the Gophers will face this season in the Big Ten. A win on Sunday would give the Gophers seven wins in the conference for the fourth consecutive year, and the fifth time in the past eight season. Four straight seven-win conference seasons would be the second-longest streak for Minnesota under Head Coach J Robinson.
Maryland's inaugural Big Ten season has been challenging. The Terrapins have yet to win a dual in their new conference, and this weekend's slate may be the toughest stretch they have faced all year, with the nation's top two teams visiting College Park. Maryland fell to Iowa, 33-3, on Friday night and now has the Gophers to deal with on Sunday afternoon. To this point in the season, the Terps have lost their seven Big Ten contests by an average score of 33-6 and enter Sunday's dual on a five-match losing streak. Maryland has dropped 12 of its last 13, picking up its only victory in the past three months in a November 2 duals against Harvard.
Each of the 10 matches on Sunday's card will be the first collegiate match between the competing wrestlers. The Gophers will send as many as seven ranked wrestlers to the mat for the dual, while the Terrapins will start two. These ranked wrestlers overlap in one match, 285, where No. 12 Michael Kroells will take on No. 13 Spencer Myers. Kroells will look to follow up an 18-7 major decision over Ohio State's Ray Gordon on Friday night, an 11-point win that marked the largest margin of victory for Kroells in his dual career to-date.
Though Sunday will be the first-ever meeting between Minnesota and Maryland as Big Ten opponents, it will be the third time the two schools have met in their collective history. The first came way back in December 1966, when Maryland defeated Minnesota, 17-12. More recently, though still more than 20 years ago, the two met at the Virginia Duals in January 1992, a match Minnesota won, 25-13.
Sunday's dual will be streamed live on BTN Plus beginning at 12 p.m. CT. BTN Plus requires a user subscription to stream live events. For updates throughout the dual, follow Gopher Wrestling on Twitter. A full recap of the event will be available here on GopherSports.com shortly afterwards.
Players Mentioned
