CORVALLIS, Ore. – The 2024 Cascade Collegiate Conference Men’s Wrestling Championship Tournament, presented by U.S. Bank, is set to begin on Friday in La Grande, Oregon.
Each day will have live video streaming, which can be found here through FloWrestling. Live results can be found here through Track Wrestling. Follow along on the CCC website and the CCC Men’s Wrestling Tournament page as the 2024 Champions are crowned.
No. 19-ranked Eastern Oregon University hosts the tournament, which has all 11 CCC teams participating – six of which are ranked and another four received votes in the final NAIA coaches poll. Evan Potter (141lbs) of Southern Oregon and Keller Rock (165lbs) of Embry-Riddle are the top-ranked individuals in their respective weight classes.
No. 3-ranked Menlo College was predicted to take the trophy and defend its 2023 CCC champion crown in the conference's preseason poll.
Friday’s matches begin at noon (PT), while Saturday’s contests are set to start at 10 a.m. The championship matches will commence at 5 p.m. All day tickets can be purchased at the door with discounts available for military, senior citizens, children, and students.
Each conference tournament awards automatic bids per weight class based on the final regular-season poll. Each conference is awarded automatic berths based on the number of wrestlers ranked in each weight class. The Cascade Collegiate Conference received the highest number of automatic qualifiers to the NAIA Championships with a total of 60, the most in CCC history. The following numbers represented the allocations in each weight class.
125 – 6
133 – 5
141 – 6
149 – 5
157 – 5
165 – 8
174 – 7
184 – 5
197 – 7
285 – 6
After all of the conference tournaments have concluded, a 16-member committee consisting of conference raters and oversight members will meet to select the remaining 30 at-large qualifiers, which will be released Tuesday, February 20 2024, by 5 p.m. (CST) from the National Office.
Once again, the CCC Wrestling Championships will have ‘true place matches,’ which help determine the exact placing of individual wrestlers who finish in sequential order in a given weight class, but never actually competed directly against each other during the tournament. The true place matches will only be used in the event an automatic qualification is available, and they will not alter team points or team standings.
Last year, the CCC sent 50 qualifiers to the NAIA Championship across all weight classes. Menlo College led the Conference with a 4th place team finish and the Oak’s Gulomjon Abdullaev highlighted the event by being named the 2023 NAIA Most Outstanding Wrestler of the Year.
The seeding and preliminary brackets will be announced on NAIA.org by 5 p.m. (CST) on Friday, February 23, 2024. The 67th Men’s Wrestling National Championship will be held February 29 – March 2, 2024, at Hartman Arena in Park City, Kansas.