TEN QUESTIONS WITH...

I was looking forward to it ever since the day I started my redshirt year. I took that year to get better and stronger and it’s really exciting to be back in a UB singlet.

2. You have moved up in weight classes from 165 as a freshman to 184 now this year, is there an adjustment that you have to make when you change weight classes?

I get to eat more food, better food. It’s a chance for me to get bigger and stronger and actually focus on the wrestling part of it instead of worrying about my weight. Instead of worrying about eating the right foods, if I’m hydrated enough. It just gives me a chance to focus more on the wrestling.

3. What does it mean to you to have been chosen as a captain?

Jeff (Parker, Buffalo’s other co-captain) and I have a lot of similar mentalities when it comes to training and doing the right things and how we act on the mats. So hopefully the guys look up to me in that way and hopefully I can show them what I feel are the right ways to train and behave. I just hope I can pass on to the guys what has been passed on to me by other captains before.

4. You already have won two tournaments this season, Mat Town and the UB Open, how does winning those events help you going into this weekend?

It helps that I’ve been there. It’s no shock to be on the mat, in the finals against another very good guy, knowing that those seven minutes are going to be a tough seven minutes. That helps and I think that it also gives you a confidence to shoot higher than just placing at a tournament. I know that I can win tournaments and that if I do the right thing I can make it happen.

5. Is the preparation different for you between dual meets and tournaments?

At tournaments you tend to get more time after weigh in to relax and get yourself warmed up. But also, after a couple of matches in a day you start to feel pretty sore and start to feel the effects of wrestling all day. Dual meets are different because you have less time to get your body adjusted after weigh-ins, you have less time to warm up and you only get one shot to wrestle. In tournaments, sometimes you have a chance to get the kinks out and still be able to win but in dual meets you don’t have that chance.

6. You’ve won seven matches in a row, does that give you confidence headed into this weekend?

Sure it does. Anytime that I can get on a roll I like to do that because I don’t like to lose. But it also helps me to know that my stuff is working and I’m doing the right things. It’s when I don’t get on those streaks that I worry about what I might be doing wrong or what I’m not doing right.

7. Do you have a pre-match routine and if so, what is it?

It’s not really a routine, but I like to get really warmed up, almost to where I feel like I just got done wrestling a match so that those feelings aren’t new to me when I get out there in the third period. A lot of times that is what wins in college, out-conditioning the other guy, so I like to make sure that I have felt that tired before I even start a match.

8. What are your goals and expectations for the rest of the season?

As a team, we would like to win out in the MAC, or come close to it. Then put up a nice number in the MAC Tournament as a team, place in the top two or somewhere in there. For myself, I would like to win a MAC Championship and get to the national tournament and make some noise there as well.

9. What has been your favorite moment as a student-athlete at UB?

It was actually kinda bittersweet. We wrestled Central Michigan two years ago at home and Kyle Cerminara and their wrestler in that weight class were 1 and 2 in the country. We had pretty packed stands for that match and it was realistic for us to beat Central that day, we ended up losing but it was a nice atmosphere to be in and hopefully we can get that going against someday.

10. What is it like for the rest of the guys with the New England Patriots being undefeated and two Foxboro-natives (Jeff Parker and Mike Ragusa) being on the team?

I’ll tell you right now, that is one of the toughest things to take, and I’m from Pittsburgh so my team is in the same conference as those guys. It would be nice if maybe they had a loss or two, it’s kinda tough to deal with right now with them being undefeated. It gets heated sometimes when we are watching the games, but I like those guys a lot.