What happened

The No. 21 Old Dominion Monarchs (13-5, 6-2 MAC) beat wrestling (10-12, 2-6 MAC), 27-6, in the Huskies’ final regular season dual Sunday at the Convocation Center.

How it happened

Old Dominion took a 6-0 lead over the Huskies, winning the matches by a combined score of 12-5 thanks to Michael Hayes and No. 11 Chris Mecate. NIU redshirt freshman Austin Culton answered with a decisive 3-1 victory over Kevin Johnson, trimming the Monarchs’ lead to three points. The first intermission closed with a score of 12-3 in favor of Old Dominion.

In the second match after the intermission the Monarchs’ No. 4 Jack Dechow set the tone for the matches to come as he defeated NIU freshman Quinton Rosser, 20-8, which gave the Monarchs a 10-point lead for the game.

Old Dominion went on to win the final three matches. They won the four matches in the second intermission by a combined score of 53-17.

Northern Star wrestlers of the dual

Kevin Beazley (197), Old Dominion redshirt sophomore, defeated the Huskies’ Alec Brown by a 17-1 technical fall. Beazley only gave up one point off an unnecessary roughness in which he slung Brown to his bench. Beazley gave his team a total of five points, which made him the highest contributor.

Culton (149) stood out for the Huskies. He won his match in overtime on a takedown, which allowed him to defeat Johnson. This was one of only two victories from the Huskies.

The quotes

“We could’ve got off to faster starts in matches,” said head coach Ryan Ludwig, according to a news release. “We didn’t start wrestling well until the third period in too many matches, and that hurt us today. But I’m very proud of Austin and Trace [Engelkes]. Culton earned his first MAC win and Engelkes installed his plan and picked up a great victory.”

“We have a great week of training ahead of us,” Ludwig said, according to the news release. “We’re going to work very hard this week and then we’re very confident that we’re going to peak the week after that at the MAC Championships.”

Up next

The Huskies are preparing for the MAC Championships, which begins 2 p.m. March 7 and noon March 8 at the Hearnes Center in Columbia, Mo. The Huskies haven’t won the MAC Championship since 1985.