By DARREN MILLER
hawkeyesports.com
IOWA CITY, Iowa — There is ready and there is ready, ready.
You know what category the University of Iowa wrestling team intends to be in Saturday and Sunday at the 2021 Big Ten Championships in University Park, Pennsylvania.
“We have to be ready to hit the mat when the first whistle blows,” Iowa head coach Tom Brands said. “We have to be ready to hit the mat in a ready, ready way where we are ready, ready.”
The Hawkeyes finished the unfamiliar regular season in a familiar way — on top the Big Ten standings. Iowa competed just five times — dominating and winning all five duals by an average of 23.6 points per dual. Iowa and Penn State (6-0) shared the regular season championship.
Four Hawkeyes earned No. 1 pre-seeds for the 107th Big Ten Tournament. Defending champion Spencer Lee is the top seed at 125 pounds, as is Jaydin Eierman (141), two-time defending champion Alex Marinelli (165) and Michael Kemerer (174). Marinelli is going for his third conference championship, something last accomplished by a Hawkeye by T.J. Williams from 1999-2001. Marinelli is 2-0 with wins over seventh-seeded Payton Robb of Nebraska and fifth-seeded Andrew Sparks of Minnesota.
“It doesn’t matter how many matches I have,” Marinelli said. “I’m just going to go out and wrestle how I know how. We wrestle so many times in the practice room and we know how to wrestle. We have wrestled our whole lives. Even though I have two matches in, I don’t care. I have to win nine straight to be a national champ.”
In no way downplaying the significance of the Big Ten Championship, Marinelli emphasized that the tournament is an NCAA qualifier. The Big Ten has been allotted 76 of the 266 automatic qualifiers.