Northwestern University Athletics
Four Northwestern Wrestlers Seeded for 2012 NCAA Championships
3/7/2012 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling
March 7, 2012
List of Division I NCAA Wrestling qualifiers
2012 NCAA Championship Bracket 
EVANSTON, Ill. – Northwestern learned its fate for the 2012 NCAA Wrestling Championships Wednesday and four of the six 'Cats competing in this year's tournament are seeded in their respective weight classes. Jason Welch is the No. 3 seed at 157 lbs., Lee Munster is No. 8 at 174 lbs., Levi Mele received the No. 9 seed at 125 lbs. and Mike McMullan pulled in the No. 10 seed at heavyweight.
Northwestern's group of six brings a range of NCAA experience and first-time wrestlers as Mele, Welch and sophomore Kaleb Friedley are returning qualifiers, while redshirt freshmen Munster, McMullan and Pierce Harger are competing in their first NCAA championship.
At 125 lbs., Mele faces a familiar opponent in the first round, taking on Princeton's Garrett Frey. These two met at the Keystone Classic, where Mele won 8-3 en route to his 125 lbs. title. Mele brings a 30-6 record into NCAA's while Frey is 26-9. The winner of the Mele/Frey match would face whoever advances between No. 8 Ryan Mango of Stanford and Shane Young from West Virginia. Top-seeded Matt McDonough of Iowa, Eastern Michigan's Jared Germaine, North Dakota State's Trent Sprenkle and Vince Rodriguez of George Mason are all on the same side of the bracket as Mele. The NU junior has a 7-5 record against the NCAA tournament field.
Friedley is unseeded at 149 lbs. and takes on the No. 3 seed, Cole VonOhlen of Air Force in his first-round match. Friedley earned a spot in the NCAA championship field by placing seventh at Big Ten's and has a 20-11 record. VonOhlen has a 36-2 record and the winner of their match meets the winner of the Steve Santos (Columbia)/Owen Willkinson (Lock Haven) bout. This year, Friedley has a 4-7 record against the 149 lbs. field.
Welch also faces a regular season rematch in his first bout. Welch, the No. 3 seed, takes on Oklahoma's Matt Lester, an opponent he beat 7-3 en route to his Midlands title. Lester brings a 20-9 record into the tournament while Welch is 23-1. The winner of that bout will meet whoever emerges from the Tommy Churchard (Purdue)/Colton Palmer (North Carolina State) bout. Four other Big Ten wrestlers are on the same side of the bracket as Welch, including No. 11 James Green of Nebraska, No. 7 Dylan Alton of Penn State, No. 10 Anthony Jones from Michigan State and second-seeded Derek St. John of Iowa. Welch went 7-1 against this year's field, with his lone loss coming in a one-point defeat to St. John in the Big Ten championship finals.
Harger is unseeded at 165 lbs. and drew another unseeded wrestler, Marshall Peppelman of Cornell. Harger went 21-12 in the regular season with a sixth place finish at Big Ten's, while Peppelman is 26-15 on the year. The winner of that match faces the winner of the No. 3 Andrew Sorenson (Iowa State)/Joe Booth (Drexel) match. Harger has a 3-11 record against the NCAA championship field this year.
Munster originally drew the No. 9 seed at 174 lbs., but after a seeded wrestler withdrew from the tournament, a re-draw gave Munster the No. 8 seed. He now faces a first-time opponent in Pittsburgh's Ethan Headlee (15-7). The winner of that match meets the victor from the No. 9 Nick Heflin (OSU)/Nick Purdue (Ohio) match, two opponents Munster has wins over this season. Munster has a 6-10 record against the field, including a 4-2 mark in his last six matches against other NCAA competitors.
After finishing fourth at the Big Ten championships, McMullan drew the No. 10 seed and meets Brendan Barlow of Kent State for the first time this season. McMullan is 23-10 while Barlow has a 27-11 record. The winner of this match faces a second-round bout against the winner of the No. 7 Jeremy Johnson (Ohio)/Cole Tobin (Wisconsin) bout, two opponents McMullan faced during the regular season. Ten heavyweights from the Big Ten received automatic bids to the NCAA championships and six of those wrestlers, including McMullan, are on the same side of the bracket. McMullan is 8-9 against the NCAA championship field.
The 2012 NCAA Wrestling Championships run from Thursday, March 15-Saturday, March 17 inside the Scottrade Center in St. Louis, Mo. The ESPN family of networks will provide complete coverage of the championships, beginning March 15 at 11 a.m. as ESPN3.com will stream Session 1 and Session 2 at 6:30 p.m. ESPNU and ESPN3.com will provide coverage of Sessions 3 (10 a.m.) and 4 (6 p.m.) on March 16 and Session 5 (10 a.m.) on March 17. The sixth and final session will air live on ESPN and ESPN3.com, beginning at 6:30 p.m. CT.
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