In its first home dual to open a season in six years, NIU wrestling defeated North Central before falling to No. 14 Stanford.

NIU had mixed results against both teams, but did shutdown North Central 30-15.

The Huskies (1-1) carried some momentum over to their meeting against Stanford (2-1). Despite holding a 13-7 lead after Matt Mougin’s impressive victory at 165 to bounce back from a letdown against North Central, NIU dropped its final four matches to end the dual with a 20-13 loss.

“It was a dual meet that I thought we let slip away,” said NIU head coach Ryan Ludwig. “We had great momentum, and we were only a couple of shots away from winning that whole dual. Our technique needs to improve in those areas and once we get that down, we’ll start locking those matches down.”

One area NIU has improved is its conditioning. Ludwig stressed the importance of improved conditioning from his squad, and the results were tangible in the loss to Stanford.

“We got exposed,” said Stanford head coach Jason Borrelli. “NIU wrestled very well. They are well conditioned, well coached; they wrestled through hard positions and outhustled us at a lot of positions. So hats off to coach Ludwig and these guys for being ready to go.”

At 125, Nick Smith posted two major decision wins. Against North Central (0-2), Smith defeated Brayan Gonzales 13-4. To get the action started against Stanford, Smith posted the highest point total of the day, beating Cardinal Matt Sencenbaugh 20-9.

“Nick Smith really had an impressive day today,” Ludwig said. “I thought his conditioning was fantastic. He stayed on the attack and put up a lot of points.”

Aside from Smith, the only Huskie to win in both matches of the dual was Kevin Fanta.

Fanta outwrestled North Central’s Andrew Zobac, a 40-match winner last season, 9-3. He then won a physical match with Stanford’s Alex Manly 9-3 as well. Fanta used strength to his advantage in his pair of wins.

“Kevin did a great job for us,” Ludwig said. “He’s more of a banger and a grinder, and I thought he did a great job.”

Mougin’s 2-1 win against Garrett Schaner was one of the highlights of NIU’s matchup against Stanford.

After a disappointing loss against North Central, Mougin held on to an early 2-1 lead by riding Schaner through the end of the match to end the day with a hard-fought win.

“[My strategy] against Stanford was to just go out and wrestle,” Mougin said. “My first match I got too nervous. It was really terrible; I’m out of shape. But I just went out there and wrestled my match and had some fun.”

Another Huskie that ended the day on a positive note was Tyler Loethen. After a pin 1:45 into his first match, Loethen grinded his way to his first collegiate win against Stanford’s Michael Kent.

“[Loethen] had a win over a very solid kid from Stanford,” Ludwig said. “He rebounded from an early setback against North Central and did a great job finishing his match in the last couple seconds on the attack.”

NIU will travel to East Lansing, Mich., to square off in the Michigan State Open this upcoming Saturday.