#4 Cornell (12-3, 8-0 EIWA) at EIWA Championships

Date & Time: Saturday-Sunday, March 4-5, 2023
Where: The Palestra (Philadelphia, Pa.)
Twitter: @CUBigRedGameday | @BigRedWrestling
Watch Live: FloWrestling
 

STORY LINES

• Eastern titles, NCAA bids and some Big Red history is on the line when the Cornell wrestling team heads to the Palestra for the 2023 EIWA Championships on March 4-5.
• The tournament will be streamed live on FloWrestling.
•  The Big Red's lineup of 10 wrestlers will attempt to qualify for some of the 45 NCAA bids available at the EIWA Championships this weekend. 
• Cornell is in search of its 27th title in program history, its 13th since 2007 and its second straight.
• The Big Red and Lehigh have combined to win every title since 2002, with challenges also expected from Princeton and Penn.
• Cornell is ranked eighth nationally in the final USA Today/NWCA Division I Wrestling Coaches Poll after going 12-3 in dual meet competition.
• Eight Big Red wrestlers are ranked in the top 25 of Intermat's rankings entering the week, including four in the top eight. 
• Cornell has set its sights high, believing it should be in the mix for yet another top 10 team finish.
• The Big Red has finished in the top 10 at every championship (excepting the 2021 tournament when Cornell didn't compete) since 2008, joining Iowa in making that claim.  
• Eight NCAA qualifiers returned this season (Dom LaJoie, Vito Arujau, Yianni Diakomihalis, Julian Ramirez, Chris Foca, Jonathan Loew, Jacob Cardenas and Lewis Fernandes), including All-Americans Arujau, Diakomihalis and Loew.
• Cornell won its 19th Ivy League title in the past 20 seasons in 2022-23, the second straight under head coach Mike Grey after he won four as a student-athlete and eight more as an assistant coach.
 

THE STREAKS

• The Big Red is 93-5 (.949) in its past 98 duals against current EIWA competitors dating back to 2010-11.
• Cornell is 132-8-1 (.940) in dual meet action against current EIWA teams dating back to 2004-05, including 119-1 (.992) against teams other than Lehigh (2019 loss at Princeton).
• Cornell has won 102 of its past 103 Ivy League dual meets dating back to the 2001-02 campaign, including 10 consecutive wins.
• Big Red wrestling is 115-2 in dual meets (.983) against unranked teams dating back to the beginning of the 2007-08 season.
• Cornell is 148-34 (.813) in dual meet competition in the past 11 seasons.
• Cornell is 59-9 (.868) in its last 64 road dual matches.
• The Big Red has crowned at least one EIWA champion in each of the last 19 seasons and in 29 of the last 30 years.
• The Big Red is 66-12 (.846) in its last 78 home duals dating back to the 2009-10 season.
• Cornell has won 44 straight meets against New York state opponents.
• Junior Yianni Diakomihalis is 53-2 and sophomore Vito Arujau is 37-2 in dual meets during their careers.
• Diakomihalis' recently snapped 75-match win streak will go down as the second-longest streak in program history (Kyle Dake '13 won his final 77 matches).
• Dating back to high school, Diakomihalis has won 316 of his last 318 matches in folkstyle (.994).
• Chris Foca has won a team-best 13 consecutive matches, with Diakomihalis right behind with 12 straight.
 

WHAT'S AT STAKE

• A total of 45 bids to the NCAA tournament will be awarded by placement at the EIWA championship (three more than in 2022).
• Only the Big Ten (88) and the Big 12 (64) will have more qualifiers than the EIWA.
• The top six at 125 and 285 pounds will automatically qualify for NCAAs.
• To earn a spot at NCAAs at 133, 141, 165 or 197, a wrestler will have to finish fifth or higher.
• The top four spots at 174 and 184 pounds will automatically qualify.
• Only the top three at 157 pounds will advance through the qualification process, with just the finalists clinching bids at 149.
 

EIWA NOTES

• Cornell has finished in the top two as a team at each EIWA Tournament since 2005 (excepting the 2021 season when it didn't compete).
• The Big Red has the top two streaks of consecutive titles, winning six straight from 1912-17 and then 11 from 2007-17.
• The Big Red has crowned at least one EIWA champion in each of its past 20 tournaments and in 30 of the last 31 it has participated in.
• Cornell has had multiple individual EIWA champions every year it has participated in the tournament since 2007.
• Since, Cornell wrestlers have won at least three EIWA titles at each weight except 285 pounds — the last Big Red heavyweight to stand at the top of the podium was Seth Charles in 1999.
 

NOTES TO KNOW

• Cornell's 17 straight Ivy League titles from 2003-19 is a record of consecutive Ivy titles by the same team in a sport. The Big Red won four more than Cornell had in men's gymnastics (from 1967-68 to 1976-77) and men's lacrosse (1973-74 to 1982-83), as well as Princeton in men's lacrosse (1994-95 to 2003-04).
• Every four-year member of the Cornell wrestling team who has enrolled since 1980 has won at least one Ivy League title during their career.
• Since the Friedman Wrestling Center opened in January of 2003, the Big Red is 73-9 in dual matches (.890) there.
• Since the start of Ivy competition, the Big Red is 312-53-1 (.854) with 42 league titles in 65 seasons (13 second place finishes). That's 118.0 games clear of second-place Penn (191-168-7) and 134.0 games ahead of Princeton (176-185-5).
• Prior to stepping on the mat against Stanford on Nov. 20, Yianni Diakomihalis hadn't wrestled in a Cornell singlet since winning the NCAA title on March 23, 2019 — a span of 973 days. Same for Vito Arujau, whose last match came earlier that same morning in the fourth-place match.
 

NEXT UP

• Cornell's qualifiers will compete at the 2023 NCAA Wrestling Championships beginning on March 16-18 at the BOK Center in Tulsa, Okla.