UB wrestling coach Jim Beichner has said the regular season is really just a long warm-up for what really matters, the Mid-American Conference Tournament, and if all goes well, the NCAA tournament.
That may be true, but Buffalo (12-5, 2-3 MAC) will surely need to perform better than Sunday's mixed results, which was the final tune up of their season when they hosted MAC rivals Eastern Michigan and Northern Illinois Sunday.
Buffalo started the day with a 25-9 loss to the Huskies and finished with a 26-18 win over the Eagles.
One of the only positives of the first match was junior Kyle Cerminara's bout against the Huskies' Greg Reardon.
Cerminara controlled Reardon's moves, going up 5-3 after two periods. The final blow came with 10 seconds left as Cerminara grabbed Reardon and flipped him for the win.
"For the most part they were a better team than us," said Beichner. "This time of year with as many injuries as we have, and some of the things that have gone wrong this season, it's just kind of catching up to us."
The Bulls started off the day with Mark McKnight winning 10-7 over the Huskies' Dave Aranda.
The Huskies then won the next five matches in a row.
It was not until five bouts later that Buffalo's Ed Pawlak would end Buffalo's frustration.
Pawlak easily dominated NIU's Danny Burk in the first and second period. Good foot positioning allowed Pawlak to hold his opponent, who couldn't get anything started. Pawlak took the match 6-1.
The intensity from Pawlak's win was supposed to energize Harold Sheryl in what would be a daunting task, but he could not capitalize against the MAC's top ranked 184-pounder Ben Heizer.
"They've got three or four ranked in the top 20 in the country," said Beichner. "We're not talking about a weak team."
The NIU dominance throughout the middleweight classes cost the Bulls valuable points. One win during this time may have changed the match, not just in score but also in motivation.
"We've got a 125-pounder wrestling 145 pounds," said Beichner. "And we've got 132-pounder wrestling 157. They're out there fighting and they're giving everything they've got. They're just out-sized."
"When two guys go head-to-head and one guy's a lot bigger, a lot of the times the bigger guy is going to win," said Beichner. "As a matter of fact, most of the time he is going to win. So it's not because of heart. Those guys are fighting harder than probably most people give them credit for."
The second match of the day, against EMU, went much better for UB.
Cerminara's match was once again the main event, and he took a 20-9 victory from Tony Lyssiotis. The match capped off a perfect MAC season for the junior, who went 5-0 on the year. He also went 34-3 overall on the year.
"Now that the season is over, I think that we all need to stay healthy, and keep our conditioning and strength up until the MACs," said Cerminara. "If we're all healthy and we're all wrestling like we could, we should be able to send a couple of guys out to nationals."
Patrick Lloyd used his agility and quickness to take a 5-4 victory for UB over Marcus Gordon in the 149-pound weight class.
Buffalo heavyweight Greg Thomas finished his match with a 7-2 win over EMU's Tim Breyer.
"I thought that Greg Thomas had done much better this year, since the beginning of this year," said Beichner. "He's improving, slowly improving and getting better. He wrestled a very good match."
Thomas reinforced his coach's sentiment.
"I think we wrestled pretty well," said Thomas. "They all did what they can do. Nobody comes out here to lose; we come out here to win."
With the regular season over, the Bulls now have their eyes set on the postseason.
"We've worked hard enough all year that we're good enough to send a couple of our guys to nationals," said Cerminara.
Lloyd also feels the Bulls are ready to have an impact in the postseason.
"Everybody wanted a hard match just to get ready for nationals," said Lloyd. "We go hard everyday, and we want to get as many wins as we can in the conference. It's good to go out on a winning note."
UB's next competition will be at the MAC Championships on March. 6 and 7. The Championships take place in Athens, Ohio.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
