Oklahoma State leads the team race with 17 points and six wrestlers in the championships bracket. Hofstra sits one point behind Oklahoma State in second with 16 points, followed by Oklahoma in third with 13.5 points.
All 10 of the No. 1 seeds rolled in their opening round matches, including Edinboro's Shawn Bunch, a returning NCAA runner-up, who dominated Jesse Sundell of Iowa State, 17-5.
"I feel pretty good," said Bunch, who now owns a 36-1 record on the season. "I went out there did what I needed to do, put it on someone, and got a good blow in before my next match."
It was a disappointing opening round for Big Ten powers Michigan and Minnesota, as both teams lost two of their seeded wrestlers. The Wolverines, who qualified nine wrestlers for the event, and a team that is expected to challenge for a top-five spot, lost two No. 12 seeds in the opening round. At 133, Mark Moos was upset by Chris Helgeson, 13-12, while 157-pound freshman Steve Luke, who won the prestigious Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational earlier this season, dropped a 6-4 decision to Will Roe of Oklahoma. Two of Minnesota's seeded wrestlers lost in the first round.
Matt Nagel, who was seeded sixth at 165 and also returning All-American, was upset by Deonte Penn of Edinboro, 8-5. And at 174, 10th-seeded Gabriel Dretsch fell to unseeded Kenne Robinson of Eastern Illinois.
There were two major upsets in the 125-pound weight class in the first round. First, Illinois' Kyle Ott -- a two-time runner up, seeded fourth -- lost to Bloomsburg's unseeded Michael Sees, 8-5. Ott had been leading 5-3 in the third when Sees got a takedown and three near-fall points to change the outcome. Then sixth-seeded Coleman Scott of Oklahoma State fell to Bryce Leonhardt of Wyoming 3-2. These early upsets will have an impact on the team title race.
Two two-time NCAA champs briefly saw their title hopes flash before their eyes in their first matches. Second-seeded Teyon Ware of Oklahoma got called for stalling twice, but won 4-3 thanks to riding time over Manuel Rivera of Minnesota. Jake Rosholt gave the Oklahoma State fans a bit of a scare during his first match when in the second period Michigan's 197-pounder Willie Breyer put the Cowboy on his back … however, the fourth-seeded Rosholt came through with a 21-9 major decision victory.
Another big upset came at 165 when Joey Bracamonte of Oregon claimed a victory over fifth-seeded Matt Pell of Missouri, 8-3. Bracamonte, despite winning the Reno Tournament of Champions earlier this season (which included a win over NCAA champion Johny Hendricks), entered the event unseeded. Bracamonte stumbled a bit in the Pac-10 Championships two weeks ago as he placed fifth and qualified for the NCAA Championships as a wildcard.
The weight class with the most surprises was 165. In addition to Nagel and Pell losing, two others lost in that weight class. No. 10 Patrick Pitsch of Arizona State lost to Daniel Thompson of the Citadel (10-4), No. 11 Stephen Anceravage of Cornell to Will Durkee of Northwestern (2-0), and No. 12 Marc Harwood of Nebraska to Larry Hall of West Virginia (11-3).
Illinois is the only team with 10 qualifiers this year. Edinboro (EWL), Lehigh (EIWA), Michigan (Big Ten), Nebraska (Big 12), and Oklahoma State (Big 12) each qualified nine.
Eight wrestlers entered the tournament undefeated -- Nick Simmons of Michigan State (125, 32-0), Nate Gallick of Iowa State (141, 33-0), Ben Cherrington of Boise State (157, 15-0), Muzaffar Abdurkhmanov of American (165, 21-0), Ryan Churella (165, 25-0), Ben Askren of Missouri (174, 39-0), Jake Herbert of Northwestern (174, 32-0), and Cole Konrad of Minnesota (Hwt., 33-0).
A total of 330 wrestlers from 69 schools are competing at the 2006 Division I Championships. There are 70 All-Americans competing. The attendance for the first session was 15,694.
Session 1 Results
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