NIU wrestling looked to win a conference matchup Friday night, but fell short 30-11 to Ohio in Victor E. Court.

The Huskies (2-8 overall, 0-2 MAC) started strong with junior Izzy Montemayor scoring a 9-1 major decision over Jacob Wojcik at 133. After Ohio scored a major decision at 141 and won another match at 149, senior Bryan Deutsch was able to win his fifth straight match in a major decision at 157 to catapult the Huskies back to an 8-7 lead and improving his record to 16-6.

After the Huskies regained the lead, the Bobcats (4-3, 1-0) were able to seal a victory by winning four of the last five matches of the night. NIU junior Brad Dieckhaus was able to defeat Ryan Garringer 8-1 at 184 to provide the only win of the second half for the Huskies.

“We’ve been grinding it out hard,” said NIU head coach Dave Grant. “These guys are pretty mentally tough. There’ll be better days for us.

“We let guys score on us more than we should have. I felt like there were a lot of opportunities to have better defense. But overall, our guys have been training hard all year and we’ll just keep moving forward with things.”

Coming into Friday night, the Huskies had faced plenty of tough competition. They attended the Midlands Championships on Dec. 29, which hosted 14 ranked opponents, before returning to NIU for a home meeting with No. 17 Central Michigan. The Huskies followed that home match with the National Duals, where 13 of the 16 teams were ranked as well.

At the Midlands, held at Northwestern’s Welsh-Ryan Arena, the Huskies were able to advance three wrestlers to the second day of the event and place 21st as a team. Senior Tristen DeShazer recorded the fastest pin of the Midlands in 15 seconds while advancing to the second day of the championships at 141. Deutsch was able to place seventh in his final appearance.

Following the Midlands, the Huskies faced a challenging conference season-opener against CMU. Returning to Victor E. Court, the Huskies were unable to rally past the Chippewas, despite a major decision from Deutsch and victories from DeShazer, Dieckhaus, and freshman Matt Mougin. The Huskies fell 21-13.

Shortly after their first conference matchup, Grant and his team headed to Northern Iowa’s UNI Dome for the National Duals. The Huskies were up against two of the toughest opponents in the duals, No. 5 Minnesota and No. 13 Iowa State.

The Huskies were unable to win against either of their opponents, falling 26-9 to the Gophers and 23-11 to the Cyclones. Deutsch and fellow senior Vince Castillo went perfect on the day while Smith and Dieckhaus both won against the Cyclones after a loss to Minnesota.

The Huskies hope to rebound from their recent struggles and grab their first conference win of the year at Kent State on Jan. 21.