Wrestling Heads To Lone Star Duals

Jan. 5, 2001

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THE SOONERS
Oklahoma, ranked sixth by both the National Wrestling Coaches Association and InterMat, enters the Lone Star Duals with a 3-1 record after sweeping a pair of duals on Jan. 2, downing Seton Hall (42-2) and Oregon (24-21). This is the fourth-straight season the Sooners have competed in the Lone Star Duals and have compiled an 8-1 record.

THE LONE STAR DUALS
This will be the first season that teams in the college division of the duals will compete in four duals. The Sooners will battle Wyoming, Brown, Harvard and Northern Iowa. OU owns a 12-0 all-time advantage against Wyoming, but the two teams have not met since 1996 when the Sooners edged the Cowboys, 19-18. Oklahoma has wrestled Brown three times and swept all three meetings. All three meetings have come at the Lone Star Duals. OU and Harvard have never met in dual competition. Northern Iowa, the Sooners final opponent at the duals, hold a 2-2 tie in all-time meetings. OU won the last meeting, 37-3, in 1997.

LIGHTNER AIMS FOR CAREER WIN MARK
Senior 141-pounder Michael Lightner will be gunning for several Sooner records this season, including the career victory mark. His 122 career wins ranks fourth-all time and he could move past Joe Stafford (123 career victories) into third place at the Lone Star Duals. The school record holder in single-season victories (42 in 1999), Lightner would need to break his own record to tie Dan Chaid's mark of 150 wins. He will also try to become OU's first four-time conference champion, the first four-time Big 12 champion and Oklahoma's first four-time All-American since John Kading 1994-1997. Lightner has won 13 of his 15 matches (86.7 percent) by bonus this season.

FRAYER ON FIRE
With nine pins on the season, including a pin of then-seventh-ranked Billy Maldonado of Iowa State, Jared Frayer has now moved into a tie with Joe Melchiore for ninth in OU career falls. The nine pins are a career high. Frayer has beaten two opponents ranked in the top 10 and started the season on an eight-match winning streak. His only losses of the season were to top-ranked Adam Tirapelle of Illinois and OSUs fourth-ranked Reggie Wright. Frayer has won 84.6 percent of his matches by bonus.

CRUMP OFF TO FAST START
Redshirt-freshman heavyweight Leonce Crump is off to a fast start, beginning his Sooner career with an 12-4 record. The champion of the Oklahoma Open, he is second on the team in pins with seven and and has won six of seven matchs since finishing fourth at the St. Louis Open.

BURROWS WINS TWO IN SEASON DEBUT
Junior Brian Burrows has recovered from a preseason knee injury and won two matches in his Sooner debut on Jan 2. He downed Seton Halls Leet Brady, 4-2, and Oregons No. 18 Eugene Harris, 8-7. A transfer from Oklahoma State, Burrows posted a 6-2 record in 2000 after recording a 16-2 mark in 1999.

KJELDGAARD, WORTHY OUT FOR SEASON AT 157
Considered one of OUs deepest weights during fall drills, 157 pounds has been depleted by a rash of early season knee injuries. Three grapplers. senior two-time NCAA qualifier David Kjeldgaard, junior Brian Burrows and redshirt-freshman Mark Worthy were in a heated three-way battle for the starting nod. Kjeldgaard is currently recovering from knee surgery, his fourth in as many seasons, and is lost for the year. Worthy sported a 5-2 record and was ranked 18th in the country by Amateur Wrestling News before suffering an ACL injury in the Oklahoma State dual. Burrows, a junior transfer from OSU, was held out of drills for much of the early season due to a knee injury but is expected to make his Sooner debut against Seton Hall

SOONER HEAD COACH JACK SPATES
Oklahoma finished fourth at the 2000 NCAA Wrestling Championships, its highest finish since 1989. The Sooners also crowned its first national champion since 1996 and two Big 12 Champions. OU tallied a 17-4-1 dual record and climbed as high as third in the polls. This came just one season after Oklahoma won the Big 12 Championship for the first time since 1986 and placed sixth at the NCAA Championships. The man who led the Sooners to those feats was head coach Jack Spates, the 1999 Big 12 Co-Coach of the Year.

Spates came to the University of Oklahoma from Cornell, where he owned the schools highest winning percentage after compiling an impressive 74-14-1 record over five seasons. Taking an Ivy League program that had no scholarships and without Eastern or national stature, Spates built a powerhouse that dominated the last two Eastern Championships during his tenure, crowning nine individual champions, and rose from no national placing to 20th-, 15th- and 10th-place finishes at the NCAA Championship. Equally impressive is the fact that his Cornell teams had the highest grade point average of any athletic team on campus. His accomplishments led him to be named the New York Collegiate Coach of the Year, Eastern Coach of the Year and New York State Wrestling Man of the Year.

Spates has developed 20 All-Americans while at OU, including four-time All-American and NCAA Champion John Kading at 190 pounds, undefeated NCAA Champion Byron Tucker at 174 pounds and three-time All-Amercian and two-time NCAA runner-up Michael Lightner.

KING PINS
With 38 pins already this season, OU wrestlers are on pace for its highest team total since the 1997-98 season. Several Sooners have either already set career highs for falls or have surpassed last seasons total. Leading the pin parade is junior Jared Frayer with a career-high nine pins. He has led OU in pins in each of the last two seasons and ranks ninth in career falls. Heavyweight Leonce Crump has tallied seven pins in his freshman campaign, the highest total by an OU heavyweight since 1998. Michael Lightners three pins surpasses his total from last season and Waymon Mays four falls is a career high. Both Frayer (60 percent) and Crump (43.8) would currently place in the top-20 in single-season fall percentage.

WELDON, JONES PROMOTED TO TOP ASSISTANTS
OU assistant coaches Barry Weldon and Rodney Jones have been promoted to head assistant coach and second assistant coach. After former assistant coach Chuck Barbee left to become the head coach at Army, head coach Jack Spated conducted a national search before promoting Weldon and Jones. Derek DelPorto will now serve as the Sooners volunteer assistant.

OU ON THE INTERNET
Sooner wrestling will broadcast selected home and road duals on the official OU athletic website, soonersports.com. The action will be called by veteran radio personality James Hale with analyst Dr. Ron Tripp. Dual broadcasts can be accessed on the sites front page. Audio with Sooner head coach Jack Spates and selected OU wrestlers will also be available by accessing the audio/video page of the website.

UP NEXT
OU will travel to to Tempe, Ariz., to battle the Arizona State Sun Devils on Jan. 12. Action begins at 7 p.m. After its dual with ASU, the Sooners will continue their tour of the West with duals against Caly Poly and Fresno State on Jan. 14.

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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