The Lindenwood men’s wrestling team hosted 38 colleges on Saturday at the Lindenwood Open at Hyland Arena. Around 650 collegiate wrestlers competed in two different divisions, on 13 mats.

The Open included Division I schools such as Mizzou, Iowa, Oklahoma State and Northwestern University, as well as DII schools like Maryville, Central Oklahoma, McKendree and Lindenwood. Big Ten schools were also represented with the attendance of Purdue, Illinois and Wisconsin.

“This event is something special,” head coach Jimmy Rollins said. “We have guys that have been here for the Division I level and have made the DI nationals or the Olympics and everything else, and some of those guys have not made the finals in this event and we have actually All-Americans not place in this event.”

Rollins said that the first Lindenwood Open in October 2010 and had 180 athletes. When the date was moved to November, the number of entrees increased, tripling to the amount of wrestlers that competed this weekend. This is the biggest open – across all of Lindenwood athletics – that is hosted annually.

Amongst the best DII wrestlers was Lion Carlos Jacquez, the 2019 National Wrestling Coaches Association Wrestler Of the Year, competing in the 125-pound category. Jacquez was also one of the four All-Americans that competed in the Open.

Jacquez took sixth place in the Gold division, the first loss the wrestler has had in a long time. Jacquez lost to a Northwestern competitor and then ended up forfeiting due to medical reasons. Last season, Jacquez finished with a perfect 32-0 record.

“Carlos took his first loss since his NCAA title last year,”Rollins said.”It was great for him to get tested and I think this is going to lit a little fire underneath him.”

No. 9 Tanner Hitchcock finished fifth in the Gold division with four wins for the day.

“He showed a lot of heart throughout the event, he didn’t wrestle his best but he had four wins over Division I opponents,” Rollins said.

With the Lion’s only competing three meets this season, sophomore Hitchcock has already competed in 14 matches, with the spring still to go.

For the Black Division, freshman Keaton Fogler won his consolation match in his weight class. Jack Tangen took sixth after being sent to the consolation bracket, winning by a 14-2 major decision in the quarterfinal match. Austin Landow also took fourth place for four victories on the day.

FloSports, a broadcasting and streaming company, provided live streams on FloWrestling.com to each of the mats across Hyland Arena and the Evans Commons basketball courts.

Even though this year’s Lindenwood Open is over, Rollins said he is already planning for next year, as it takes a full-year to organize. Some DI and DII schools are already set to attend the open next year, depending on some NCAA calendars.

The Lions will hit the mats again on Saturday, Dec. 7 in Springfield, Missouri, for the Drury Open.