Hoosiers ready for 'mountain' of Big Ten schedule with Badgers, Boilers

Michigan football coach Lloyd Carr once compared an upcoming football season to climbing Mt. Everest. If Carr thinks that's tough, he must never have looked at a Big Ten wrestling schedule.\nThe IU wrestling team starts a climb of its own this weekend as it begins its conference slate with Ohio State Friday night and Purdue Sunday afternoon. \nIf national rankings are the gold standard for team strength, the Big Ten has to be one of the toughest conferences in the nation. Exactly half of the top 10 positions are filled out by Big Ten teams, including Minnesota — the No 1-ranked team in the country.\n"It's no slouch schedule," said senior Joe Dubuque. "You got eight dual meets and it's probably going to be the eight hardest dual meets of the year."\nCoach Duane Goldman said all team members realize they need to be ready for every match.\n"It's a huge challenge," Goldman said about the schedule. "Virtually every team we wrestle is ranked, and most of them, to be honest, are ranked ahead of us."\nPurdue (8-3) and Ohio State (3-5) are the only teams in the Big Ten not ranked in the top 25. Still, Goldman asserts that both of these teams will make for a tough start to the brutal schedule.\n"The thing with this team is we're not able to take anybody lightly," he said. "We have to be prepared to go to war every time we step on the mat."\nThe Buckeyes have had some trouble with injuries this season, but Goldman said that it looks like they are healthy just in time for the Big Ten Season. Ohio State has one ranked wrestler, Jeff Jaggers, No. 14 in the 149-pound division.\nThe Hoosiers don't need any extra motivation to prepare for the Purdue match. \n"I don't like Purdue," Dubuque said, "and I guarantee they don't like us. It's a rivalry, everybody gets pumped up a little bit more for that dual meet. I think we're going to go out and I think we're really going to set a statement up at Purdue. I think we're really going to give it to them."\nDubuque, who is ranked No. 1 and is the defending national champion in the 125-pound weight class, is looking to extend his winning streak of 19 straight matches. He currently holds a 12-0 record for the season. \nPurdue has a number of ranked wrestlers in its program, including Chris Fleeger, the No. 6 wrestler in the 133-pound division. Redshirt freshman Andrae Hernandez will represent the Hoosiers at 133 pounds, and the match might be a little more personal than usual to him. Hernandez personally knows Fleeger and many other Boilermaker wrestlers. His brother Rene wrestled there before graduating last season, one of many factors that Hernandez said gets him even more excited to face the Boilermakers.\n"I know Fleeger pretty well," he said. "And just that he's ranked high gives me an opportunity to wrestle some good competition and try to get up in the rankings. With him being from Purdue and me being from IU, I mean, that's always big hype."\nThe Hoosiers match against Ohio State will be at 7 p.m. Friday, at University Gym. The match at Purdue will take place at 2 p.m. Sunday.