Mid-West Swing Wraps Calendar Year

KENT- The Golden Flashes wrap the 2023 portion of the schedule with a trip to Saint Louis and Illinois to face Lindenwood, Cal Baptist and SIU-E on Sunday and Northern Illinois on Tuesday.

The Flashes are coming off a pair of narrow defeats in duals on Friday against VMI and Gannon and a solid showing at the Cleveland State Open. Blake Schaffer led the charge over the weekend, the 197-pounder went 7-1 over the weekend. He earned bonus points in both dual matches then made his way to the title bout of the Cleveland State Open and improved to 13-5 on the year.

The weekend starts with the first ever meeting between the Flashes and the Lindenwood Lions on Sunday at 1 pm ET/Noon CT. That match will be streamed on ESPN +. The Lions haven't wrestled in a few weeks, last competing in the SIU-E Cougar Clash at the start of December. The Lions' top wrestlers are at the heavyweights as Ryan Golnick (197) and David Hernandez (HWT) are the highest ranked wrestlers according to Wrestle State and are tied for third on the team in wins.

Kent State will immediately hop on the bus and head from Saint Louis to Edwardsville, Illinois for a tri-meet with Cal Baptist and SIU-E. The Flashes will take on the Cougars first at 4:30 ET/3:30 CT in the first MAC match of the year for the Flashes. Kent State has gone 6-2-1 against the Cougars all time, SIU-E got their first win in the series last year in Kent, 25-12.

The schools rank 10^th and 11^th, respectfully in the latest MAC wrestling rankings. The Cougars are led by junior Caleb Tyus at 149 pounds who is ranked third in the MAC and top-30 overall. The Cougars strength lies in the 133-149 pound classes with each starter ranked in the top-5 in the MAC. The match to watch will be at 197 pounds as Schaffer and Ryan Yarnell are ranked fourth and fifth, respectfully in the latest MAC rankings.

The Sunday trio ends with the first meeting between Cal Baptist and the Flashes. The Lancers wrestler out of the Big 12 and are 2-2 on the season. They are strong at the lightweights with Eli Griffin ranked in the top-25 at 125 pounds and Hunter Leake at 5-1 on the season at 133 pounds. A familiar name to MAC wrestling fans is Peter Acciardi, the 174-pound senior spent his first three seasons in Buffalo.

Tuesday wraps the calendar year for Kent State as they head north to DeKalb to tangle with Northern Illinois on Tuesday morning for a noon ET/11 am CT dual. The Flashes will look to snap a four dual losing streak to the Huskies, Kent State does own the all-time series 24-10-2. Blake West leads the Huskies, the 125 pound sophomore is ranked third in the MAC and is top-50 overall according to Wrestle Stat. Matches to watch are at 141 pounds where Billy Meiszner and Dylan Gvillo are ranked sixth and eighth in the MAC and at 197 where Schaffer is ranked fourth and Carter Grewe is sixth in the MAC rankings. NIU will stream the game through the NIU Live Sidearm platform.

Links to watch all the matches are on the wrestling schedule page. After Tuesday, the Flashes are off for the holidays and will return to action on January 5^th at the Franklin and Marshall Open. Projected lineups for all five teams are listed below.

Weight	Kent State	Lindenwood	SIU-E	Cal Baptist	NIU (Tues)
125	Adan Benevidez/Nico Calello	Austin Kegley	Davian Guanajuato./Deion Johnson	Eli Griffin	Blake West
133	Pablo Castro/Matt Ellis	Caiden Pelc	Marcel Lopez	Hunter Leake	Mikey Kaminski
141	Billy Meiszner	Ben Bohr	Danny Martinez/Eric Almarinez	Emilio Trujillo	Dylan Gvillo
149	Kaden Setzer/Cael Andrews	Cruz Lara or Dylan Boyd	CalebTyus/Braxton Strick	Dayne Morton	Tommy Curran
157	Ethan Barr/Keegan Knapp/Dylan Carlosn	Zach Rackers or Luke Kemper	Brock Woodcock/Jorden Johnson	Chaz Hallmark /Carter Schubert	Brett Smith
165	Aaron Ferguson	Kaden Charboneau	Bradley Gillum	Mateo De La Pena	Tommy Bennett
174	Mitch Broskie/Holden Martin/Waylon Wehler	Jared Shafer	Dom Lopez/Hayden Trezek	Justin Phillips	Hayden Pummel
184	Kyle Snider	Luke Shaver or McKinley Kemper	Deron Pulliam/Aaron Cramer	Nathan Haas	Matt Zuber
197	Blake Schaffer	Ryan Golnick	Ryan Yarnell/Nick Nosler	Eli Sheeren	Carter Grewe
285	Brentan Simmerman/Josh Boggan	David Hernandez	Bryson Buhk/Dan McKiernan	Chris Island	Jacobi Jackson

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Players Mentioned

Cael Andrews

Ethan Barr

Josh Boggan

Nico Calello

Matt Ellis

Aaron Ferguson

Keegan Knapp

Holden Martin

Billy Meiszner

Blake Schaffer

Kaden Setzer

Brentan Simmerman

Kyle Snider

Waylon Wehler

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