The Big Ten wrestling tournament spanned two-days this year being at the Bryce Jordan Center in State College. This tournament is known for its highly competitive brackets, primarily bringing in hundreds of people from all over eager to watch.

Penn State’s wrestling team won seven out of the ten weight classes, the others come from Ohio State and Michigan.

The athletes that placed at the Big Ten wrestling tournament were Luke Lilledahl (215), Ohio State’s Ben Davino (133), Ohio State’s Jesse Mendes (141), Shayne Van Ness (149), PJ Duke (157), Mitchell Mesenbrink (165), Levi Haines (174), Rocco Welsh (184), JosH Barr (197) and MIchigan’s Taye Ghadiali (285).

These athletes all qualified in their respective weight classes and moved onto the NCAA Championships, which concluded this past weekend

Some of the key matchups for the 2026 Big Ten Championships were at 133 pounds between Marcus Blaze from Penn State competing in the finals against Ohio State’s Mendes, while 125-pounder Lilledahl — ranked No. 1 and being dominant all match — defeated fourth-ranked Nic Bouzakis of Ohio State.

Even though most of the matches were great to watch, there can be great upsets like any other tournament. Some of those included at 174 where Haines, a 2024 NCAA champion, faced a hard battle after being seeded behind Christopher Minto from Nebraska.

These matches were some of the most entertaining to watch throughout the while tournament.

The Big Ten Championship has quite a long history, this event has been going on since 1926 (112 years). The Iowa Hawkeyes have been the most successful when it comes to winning Big Ten titles thanks to a winning streak of 27 from 1974-88. Overall, Iowa has 37 titles followed by Illinois with 17 and Indiana with 14. Most recent wins have been from Penn State, who just won their fourth Big Ten title, bringing them to ten total conference championships.

The Big Ten Wrestling Championship is a proving ground where the best collegiate wrestlers compete against each other to validate their whole season, with the winner usually being a high contender for a national title.

This article was written by a local student at Jersey Shore High School as part of the Press Forward Program through the Centre Foundation