Championship Central Page

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. (Wrestling) – The 2016 Middle Atlantic Conference Wrestling Championship is set for Saturday, Jan. 23 at 10:30 a.m. at Lamade Gymnasium on the campus of Lycoming College. It is the 71st MAC Wrestling Championship.
 
Admission at the gate is $6 for adults, $4 for senior citizens, $2 for students and children under the age of six are free. Directions and parking information can be found on the championship central page.
 
Live results and video coverage will be available on the championship central page. The mats to be covered by live video will be announced after the championship seeding is completed on Thursday. The first and third place bouts will be covered by live video coverage.
 
Five institutions will be competing for the MAC Wrestling Championship, including Delaware Valley University, King’s College, Lycoming College, Messiah College and Wilkes University.
 
2015 CHAMPIONSHIP RESULTS
Delaware Valley edged Messiah by 1.5 points to claim the 2015 MAC Wrestling Championship a season ago. The Aggies now share a conference-leading 15 MAC wrestling titles with Lycoming. Delaware Valley recorded 125.5 points with five of the 10 individual champions, and three second-place wrestlers. In total, the Aggies had 10 wrestlers make the podium to receive gold, silver and bronze medals.
 
Messiah, who won the 2014 MAC title, finished runner-up with 124 points. The Falcons also had five individual champions at the 2015 MAC Championship, as well as one runner-up. Messiah had eight wrestlers make the podium to receive a medal.
 
Wilkes finished third with 73 points, while Lycoming (58.5 points) and King’s (21.5 points) came in fourth and fifth, respectively.
 
RETURNING CHAMPIONS
Returning individual champions:
125: Messiah junior Lucas Malmberg returns for his third season as a two-time MAC champion in the 125 lbs. weight class (2014, 2015). Malmberg is also a two-time NCAA Mideast Region Champion and a two-time national silver medalist in the 125 lbs. weight class.
 
165: Messiah junior Larry Cannon won the 157 lbs. weight class at the 2015 MAC Championship, but made the move to the 165 lbs. weight class this season for the Falcons.
 
174: Messiah senior Josh Thomson is a two-time MAC champion. Thomson won the 2014 title in the 184 lbs. weight class, but made the move to the 174 lbs. weight class last season where he won another conference title. Thomson remains in the 174 lbs. weight class this season for the Falcons. Thomson is a two-time NCAA Mideast Region Champion, and a three-time all-American with two bronze medals at nationals.
 
184: Messiah sophomore Ben Swarr won the 184 lbs. weight class title at the 2015 MAC Championship as a freshman. Swarr also won the NCAA Mideast Region title and qualified for nationals.
 
285: Delaware Valley junior Zach Roseberry won the 285 lbs. weight class title a season ago at the conference championship. Roseberry finished runner-up in 2014. The junior is a two-time NCAA East Region Champion, and a two-time all-American with a bronze medal at nationals in 2015.
 
Other returning wrestlers:
133: Wilkes sophomore Matthew Grossmann returns for his sophomore season after winning the 133 lbs. weight class NCAA Division III national title. Grossmann finished runner-up at the 2015 MAC Championship. The sophomore was named the 2015 MAC Wrestler of the Year and 2015 MAC Rookie of the Year.
 
133: Delaware Valley senior Conor Kirkegard returns for his final season as a two-time MAC silver medalist. Kirkegard finished runner-up in 2014 in the 133 lbs. weight class, and runner-up in 2015 in the 125 lbs. weight class. Kirkegard made the move back to 133 for his final season with the Aggies.
 
141: Delaware Valley sophomore Tim Ambacher transferred from Lycoming in the offseason. Ambacher, with Lycoming, finished runner-up in the 141 lbs. weight class at last year’s conference championship.
 
149: Lycoming junior Seth Lansberry finished runner-up at the 2015 MAC Championship in the 149 lbs. weight class.
 
174: Messiah sophomore Derek Beitz finished runner-up in the 165 lbs. weight class at last year’s conference championship. Beitz made the move to the 174 lbs. weight class this season.
 
174: Wilkes senior Kyle Diesel is a two-time MAC silver medalist in the 174 lbs. weight class. Diesel finished runner-up in both 2014 and 2015.
 
NATIONAL RANKINGS
Two of the five MAC teams enter the conference championship ranked in the National Wrestling Coaches Association (NWCA) Division III poll. Messiah currently ranks No. 6, while Wilkes is ranked No. 17.
 
Individually, the MAC has 11 wrestlers ranked in the top-10 of their respective weight class by the NWCA.
 
HISTORY
It is the 71st MAC Wrestling Championship dating back to the first championship in 1936. There was no championship from 1944-46 due to World War II, and from 2007-13, the MAC did not sponsor wrestling.
 
Delaware Valley and Lycoming lead all current and former conference members with 15 conference wrestling (team) titles. Wilkes is third with 14 titles. The Aggies won four-straight (2002-06) titles. Since 1977, Lycoming and Delaware Valley have combined for 28 of the 31 titles. From 1966-75, Wilkes won seven-straight titles. The only other team to claim that many consecutive titles was former MAC member Gettysburg College from 1949-55. Lycoming leads all schools with 107 individual MAC titles, while Delaware Valley has 105.
 
FURTHER NOTES
The 2016 NCAA Division III Championships will be held at the U.S. Cellular Center in Cedar Rapids, Iowa from March 11-12.