The NIU wrestling team will be tested tomorrow at the Kaufman-Brand Open.

The host team is the University of Nebraska-Omaha, the number one school in Division II, and the event is the largest one-day collegiate wrestling tournament in the nation.

The open starts at 9 a.m. and around 40 teams are expected, such as Oklahoma State, Iowa and Minnesota, and more than 600 wrestlers.

With the size of the tournament, NIU coach Dave Grant hopes this will be a platform for his wrestlers to prove themselves.

“Our guys have the opportunity to go out and show all of their skills and how hard they’ve worked all year,” Grant said. “The sky is the limit.”

Each weight class will be split into two divisions. The silver division will have wrestlers 20 and younger and the gold division will have wrestlers 21 and older.

Thus each weight class will have a silver division champion and a gold division champion. This will be the Huskies’ second individual tournament and they wrestled well the first time around.

Red-shirt sophomores Vince Castillo (141) and Bryan Deutsch (157) along with freshman Steve Zimmerman (149) all collected championships at the Pointer Open earlier in the season.

Both Castillo and Deutsch have been turning heads with a 6-1 record on the season, but both enter the open having lost their last match.

Zimmerman has also been impressing people with an ideal 4-0 record. Fellow freshman Izzy Montemayor (125) began the season with a loss but has been on fire since with a 7-3 record.

The youth of the Huskies has everyone looking toward the future as well.

“This team is young, but we’re going to get better and better as we go,” said Grant.

Some of these wrestlers have been pushed into the spotlight due to injuries to Pat McLemore (141), Bryan O’Connor (165), Brad Dieckhaus (184) and Dakota Greenhaw (285). These mishaps haven’t put down the spirits of the team, especially Grant.

“It feels a little tougher,” Grant said. “But it’s not where we start. It’s where we end.”