NCAA Releases Coaches Rankings And NCAA Championship Pre-Allocations
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The NCAA announced the pre-allocations and first coaches ranking for the 2021 NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships on Thursday (Feb. 11) and eight Virginia wrestlers found themselves in the rankings.
The weight class conference champion in each qualifying tournament will earn an automatic qualifier to the national championships. Each conference was awarded additional pre-allocations based on the five-year average (2016-20) of pre-allocations earned by the conference in each weight class.
In recent years, pre-allocations have been determined by a formula measuring Division I winning percentage, ratings percentage index and coaches’ ranking. A decrease in overall matches, and in particular non-conference matches, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, led the NCAA Division I Wrestling Committee to transition to using the five-year historical average to determine pre-allocations for 2021. For any adjustments in conference alignment over the last five years, historical pre-allocations stayed with the conference where they were earned. The competition status of schools for 2021 also did not impact the calculation of pre-allocations.
Virginia had wrestlers ranked in 8-of-10 weight classes with the NCAA Coaches Panel ranking the top 33 wrestlers nationally in each weight.
Virginia Wrestlers In The Coaches Rankings
133: Louie Hayes – 7th
141: Brian Courtney – 14th
157: Justin McCoy – 17th
165: Jake Keating – 11th
174: Vic Marcelli – 28th
184: Michael Battista – 21st
197: Jay Aiello – 10th
HWT: Quinn Miller – 20th
The coaches rankings are determined by a vote of 14 coaches in each weight class with two head coaches from each conference. For ranking purposes, coaches may only consider a wrestler that has been designated as a starter at a respective weight class. For the first ranking, wrestlers must have two Division I matches in the weight class to be considered with at least one within the last 30 days.
NCAA Pre-Allocations For 2021 NCAA Championships
The pre-allocation number listed for each weight class below is the number of wrestlers from the ACC that will qualify for an allocated slot to the 2021 NCAA Championships in addition to the individual champion at each weight class.
125: 2
133: 3
141: 2
149: 2
157: 3
165: 2
174: 2
184: 2
197: 2
HWT: 3
After the conference tournaments have concluded, the Division I Wrestling Committee will meet in-person to select the remaining at-large qualifiers to fill out the 33-man bracket in each weight class, which will be announced March 9, while brackets and seeding will be announced on ncaa.com at 6 p.m. March 10.