Piccininni and Okie State make big statement in WIN’s Feb 25 Rankings

Photo: Oklahoma State’s Nick Piccininni declared himself a strong candidate to win the 125-pound NCAA championship next month when the Cowboy pinned Iowa’s defending national champion Spencer Lee on Feb. 24 in Stillwater, Okla. (Jeremy Cook photo)

NEWTON, Iowa — Oklahoma State put an exclamation mark to the end of the regular season with a 27-12 dual victory over Iowa, especially 125-pound Nick Piccininni who pinned defending champ Spencer Lee and has moved up to second in WIN’s Feb. 25, 2019 Rankings, presented by Cliff Keen Athletic.

The Cowboys (15-0) are ranked second in WIN’s final dual-team rankings and third in the Tournament Power Index with nine ranked wrestlers and 77 points.

Defending national champ Penn State (14-0) remained the top-ranked team in both ratings as the Nittany Lions  (with 123 TPI points) also feature nine ranked wrestlers, including four wrestlers — Jason Nolf (157), Vincenzo Joseph (165), Mark Hall (174) and Bo Nickal (197) — who are ranked No. 1 at their weight class.

The remaining six top-ranked wrestlers also remained the same, including Cornell’s 141-pound Yianni Diakomihalis, who defeated Ohio State’s second-ranked Joey McKenna last weekend.

WIN’s weekly individual rankings are a prediction of final NCAA tournament placements at the 2019 NCAA Championships, March 21-23 in Pittsburgh, and based on each wrestler’s full season of competition up until each week’s release. WIN’s Tournament Power Index is a total of the TPI points that all the wrestlers on a respective team have earned based on their ranking. A team’s TPI points and TPI ranking is a prediction of a where a team might finish at the national tournament at this point in the season with their current line-up.

WIN’s TPI point totals are broken down by the following individual rankings: 1st – 20 (16 AA points + 4 advancement points); 2nd – 16 (12+4); 3rd – 13.5 (10+3.5); 4th – 12.5 (9+3.5); 5th – 10 (7+3); 6th – 9 (6+3); 7th – 6.5 (4+2.5); 8th – 5.5 (3+2.5). Additional points for other rankings include: 9th/12th – 2; 13th/16th – 1.5; 17th-20th – 1. TPI points will be lower than the final actual NCAA tournament points because it does not include bonus points.

Teams will now take two weeks off to prepare for one of eight NCAA Div. I qualifying tournaments, which will eventually send 330 wrestlers to the national tournament:

WIN Magazine’s Feb. 25, 2019 Dual-Team Rankings

WIN Magazine’s Feb. 25, 2019 Tournament Power Index (TPI)

WIN Magazine’s Feb. 25, 2019 Individual Rankings

125 pounds                                               

133 pounds

141 pounds

149 pounds

157 pounds                                               

165 pounds                                               

174 pounds                                               

184 pounds

197 pounds

Heavyweight