Senior Night Highlights Final Homestand for Sooners

NORMAN – The No. 22 Oklahoma wrestling team (6-4, 2-4 Big 12) returns to Norman for its home finale on Saturday, Feb. 1 when they take on No. 20 Missouri (5-7, 4-1 Big 12) in a top-25 conference dual. First bout is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. CT inside McCasland Field House, the official home to OU's home duals in the 2024-25 season for the 97th year. Saturday night's matchup will be available for streaming on ESPN+ with Chad McKee and legendary OU wrestling coach Jack Spates on the call.

Oklahoma will honor seniors Antonio Lorenzo, Cleveland Belton, Willie McDougald, Gaven Sax, Seth Seago and Ryder Wiese before the dual against the Tigers with the ceremony scheduled to start 20 minutes before the first bout.

Doors will open one hour prior to start of the duals. A post-match autograph session will be held in the main (south) lobby of McCasland Field House immediately following the final bout. Schedule posters will be available for free.

SOONER QUICK HITTERS

In their last outing, the Sooners fell on the road to No. 13 Iowa State (25-6) and No. 5 Northern Iowa (26-13) in back-to-back nights. Senior Antonio Lorenzo and junior Juan Mora proved to be consistent bright spots in OU's lineup, as both competitors finished the weekend 2-0 with a ranked win in their respective weight class. Senior Mosha Schwartz pulled off the biggest win of the road trip, knocking off UNI's two-time NCAA qualifier, No. 5 Cael Happel by a 9-7 decision.

Oklahoma kicked off the new year with nine placers at the Southern Scuffle on Jan. 5, led by Gaven Sax, who finished runner-up in the 174-pound bracket. OU finished in a tie for second overall, finishing with 126.5 points along with Penn State. The Sooners finished behind only team champion Army (132.5). North Carolina (91) and North Dakota State (90.5) rounded out the top five.

SENIOR SENDOFF

Oklahoma will honor six of its seniors before Saturday's dual in Antonio Lorenzo, Cleveland Belton, Willie McDougald, Gaven Sax, Seth Seago and Ryder Wiese.

As a senior class, the group has amassed 207 career wins, one individual conference title and seven NCAA Championships appearances.

SERIES HISTORY

One of OU's longest running series by years will be renewed this weekend in Norman as the Sooners battle the Tigers. Only OU's series' with Oklahoma State (1920), Texas A&M (1921), Iowa State (1922), Northern Iowa (1922) and Kansas (1922) are longer in program history in terms of years since it began.

In a series that dates back to 1923, Oklahoma is 42-16-0 all-time against Missouri. Saturday's dual will be the 59th meeting between the teams.

The Sooners welcome the Tigers to McCasland Field House losing the series' last three matchups. OU is looking for its first win against Mizzou since defeating the Tigers at home 24-18 in 2017.

YEAR 2 OF THE KISH ERA IN NORMAN

Roger Kish was named head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners on May 2, 2023 after spending 12 seasons as the head coach at North Dakota State.

Kish made quite a splash in his first season as Oklahoma's head coach in 2023-24, helping the Sooners secure their highest NCAA finish (23rd) in eight seasons. Additionally, Kish helped elevate Stephen Buchanan to All-American status for the third time in his career. Buchanan put together a dominant 27-3 season, finishing third at the NCAA Championships in the 197-pound bracket to become OU's highest NCAA finisher in eight seasons.

Kish had a 108-70 record in dual meets as the Bison head coach including a 50-30 record in conference duals, becoming the second winningest coach in program history, behind only the legendary Bucky Maughan who led the Bison to four NCAA Division II national championships.

Turning the Bison into consistent winners as a Big 12 affiliate program, Kish's teams had 54 NCAA championship qualifiers in his 12 seasons as head coach including 21 over his last four seasons. He had six wrestlers advance to earn All-America honors.

Kish directed the Bison to a pair of NCAA West Regional/ Western Wrestling Conference championships (2014, 2015) and two WWC regular season titles (2013, 2015). He was a three-time WWC Coach of the Year.

OU will look to continue adding to their rich wrestling history under Kish, which includes seven national championships, 24 conference titles and 278 All-Americans.

WELCOME TO NORMAN

In the offseason, head coach Roger Kish added 17 newcomers to the roster, including three former NCAA qualifiers in seniors Gaven Sax (North Dakota State) and Cleveland Belton (Oregon State), as well as sophomore Bradley Hill (Iowa). Redshirt freshman Carter Schubert (Cal Baptist) rounded out the Sooners' incoming transfer additions. The group of transfers joined 13 incoming freshmen that made up Kish's first full recruiting class since being hired as Oklahoma's head coach. The 2024 class was rated No. 3 overall in the country, according to Intermat's final rankings big board.

Oklahoma's 2024 recruiting class included the nation's No. 16 pound-for-pound wrestler Beric Jordan and one of the top 145-pounders in Alex Braun of Woodbury, Minnesota per FloWrestling. Jordan, a Stillwater High School product, was joined by five other in-state recruits that are all top-200 signees in Edmond North's Hunter Hollingsworth and Jude Randall, Bixby's Clay Giddens-Buttram, Stillwater's Landyn Summer and Piedmont's Cash Donnell.

Braun was joined by Owen Eck of Andale, Kansas and Koufax Christensen of Waukee, Iowa as the outof-state recruits for the 2024 cycle. Kish's first recruiting class boasted numerous all-area, all-state and All-America honors, as well as state championships.

The Sooners' 2025 recruiting class is ranked No. 10 nationally by FloWrestling and includes four incoming freshmen ranked in MatScouts' Senior Big Board which charts the top 250 recruits in the country.

SOONERS IN THE RANKINGS

Oklahoma enters its eighth and final home dual of the season as the No. 22-ranked team in the country, according to the National Wrestling Coaches Association.

Projected starters Antonio Lorenzo, Cleveland Belton, Mosha Schwartz, Willie McDougald, Tate Picklo, Gaven Sax, DJ Parker and Juan Mora each made the latest Intermat rankings (Jan. 28) in their respective weight classes.

CHAMPIONSHIP PEDIGREE

Since the inception of collegiate wrestling in 1928, Oklahoma has been one of the most dominant wrestling programs in the country. The Sooners have seven team national titles, 67 individual national champions and 278 All-Americans.

In addition to the Sooners' seven national championships, Oklahoma has finished as runner-up at NCAAs 12 times, third most in the country. The Sooners' 40 finishes inside the top four are the fourth-most nationally and OU has grabbed a top-10 spot at NCAA's 64 times (third most) out of 96 championships held.

The NCAA named Oklahoma the fourth-greatest wrestling dynasty in the country in the summer of 2020.

Oklahoma has collected 24 overall conference championships and 186 individual conference champions in school history. The team's most recent conference championship came in 2021, their first in 19 years.

OU assistant Teyon Ware was a four-time All American wrestler for the Sooners from 2003-2006.

HOME OF THE HODGE

The Sooners honored legendary wrestler and Sooner, Danny Hodge, before their 189th Bedlam dual with Oklahoma State on Dec. 13.

Hodge, who is a National Wrestling Hall of Famer, died on Dec. 24, 2020, at the age of 88 in his hometown of Perry, Okla. He came to Norman from Perry in 1955 to wrestle for hall-of-fame-coach Port Robertson.

Hodge compiled a perfect 46-0 record as a Sooner, winning 36 of his matches via fall. He pinned 24 consecutive opponents and was never taken down during his college career.

The legend won three consecutive national titles and his performance at the 1957 NCAA championship earned him Most Outstanding Wrestler honors and led the Sooners to their fourth national championship.

The Hodge Trophy, which is wrestling's equivalent of the Heisman Trophy, is named after Hodge.

To this day, Hodge is the only wrestler to appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated (April, 1957).

50TH ANNIVERSARY: CELEBRATING THE 1974 CHAMPION SOONERS

Oklahoma honored its 1974 national championship team during the intermission of their 189th Bedlam dual with Oklahoma State on Dec. 13.

The 1974 NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships were the 44th NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships to be held. Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa hosted the tournament at Hilton Coliseum.

Under legendary head coach Stan Abel, Oklahoma took home the team championship with 69.5 points and two individual champions (118 lbs: Gary Breece; 158 lbs: Rod Kilgore). The 1974 Championship remains OU's last team title win.

The first Sooner wrestler to become a four-time All-American, Breece capped his career by winning the 1974 NCAA title at 118-pounds with a tense, lowscoring 3-2 victory over Jack Spates of Slippery Rock. Ironically, Spates would later become OU's head coach from 1994-2011. A two-time national finalist and two-time Big Eight Champion, Breece was a crafty, hardworking wrestler with solid offense and good defense. While in high school, Breece was a two-time Oklahoma state champion. He won his first title for Edmond Memorial in 1968 and his second for Tulsa Memorial in 1969.

As a wrestler at OU, Kilgore was a four-time All-American, won two Big Eight conference titles and two NCAA championships. He was the first OU wrestler to win 100 matches.

Projected Starters (Rankings by (InterMat)
	No. 22 Oklahoma
Weight	Wrestler	Record
125	No. 28 Antonio Lorenzo or Beric Jordan	12-6 / 11-3
133	No. 23 Cleveland Belton or Carter Schmidt	9-5 / 7-8
141	No. 18 Mosha Schwartz or Alex Braun	9-4 / 6-3
149	No. 16 Willie McDougald	14-4
157	Layton Schneider or KJ Evans or Landyn Sommer	3-3 / 6-4 / 4-3
165	No. 30 Tate Picklo or Mannix Morgan	11-5 / 4-6
174	No. 15 Gaven Sax	9-3
184	No. 20 DJ Parker or Eli Cordy	13-4 / 1-4
197	Bradley Hill or Seth Seago or Ryan Nichols	7-10 / 1-2 / 2-2
HWT	No. 25 Juan Mora or Ricky Thomas	10-4 / 4-5

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