No. 8 Missouri wrestling hosts reigning national champion, No. 3 Ohio State, for dual

Missouri wrestling puts its streak of 30 consecutive dual victories on the line Saturday against defending national champion Ohio State.

The eighth-ranked Tigers and third-ranked Buckeyes square off at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Hearnes Center in Columbia.

Missouri went 24-0 in duals last season and opened this season with wins against Southern Illinois-Edwardsville and Northern Iowa, beating the 25th-ranked Panthers 24-19 in a key Mid-America Conference clash Nov. 28 in Cedar Falls, Iowa.

The Tigers, who won the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational last weekend led by 197-pound champion J’den Cox and 149-pound champion Lavion Mayes, haven’t lost a dual since Jan. 31, 2014, at Oklahoma State.

Missouri has eight wrestlers ranked in the top 20 and Ohio State has seven.

Half of the 10 matches in Saturday’s dual, which will be streamed on ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app, will be a clash of ranked wrestlers.

Tigers sophomore Barlow McGhee is ranked No. 6 at 125 pounds. He’ll face top-ranked Nathan Tomasello.

No. 12 Zach Synon, a Missouri junior, draws fourth-ranked Johnni DiJulius at 133, while No. 13 Matt Manley, a Tigers junior, gets sixth-ranked Micah Jordan at 141.

Tomasello and Jordan won championships at the Cliff Keen Invitational.

Blue Springs graduate Daniel Lewis, a Missouri redshirt freshman who is ranked No. 9 at 165 pounds after a third-place showing last week in Las Vegas, tussles with No. 2 Bo Jordan in the 165-pound bout, which is perhaps the marquee match of the dual.

Finally, at 184, No. 6 Willie Miklus, a Tigers sophomore, battles No. 11 Kenny Courts.

Mayes, a junior who is ranked No. 3, senior 174-pounder Blaise Butler, a transfer from Virginia who is ranked fourth, and Cox, a junior who is ranked No. 2, don’t face ranked opponents.

Ohio State’s Jake Ryan (157, No. 14) and Nick Tovanello (285, No. 18) also drew unranked opponents.

Missouri also hosts No. 21 Ohio for a dual this weekend. The Tigers and Bobcats tangle in a critical MAC regular-season clash at 1 p.m. Sunday at the Hearnes Center.

That dual also will be streamed on ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app.

This story was originally published December 11, 2015 at 7:12 PM with the headline "No. 8 Missouri wrestling hosts reigning national champion, No. 3 Ohio State, for dual."