TEMPE, Ariz. — The Sun Devils head to the Midwest for the 56th Annual Ken Kraft Midlands Championships hosted by Northwestern. The prestigious tournament returns to Hoffman Estates, Illinois' Sears Centre Arena outside of Chicago Dec. 29-30, 2018.
Tickets can be purchased on the Sears Centre website or by calling (888) SEARSTIX (732-7784). There are options for an all-session pass as well as day passes for each day. The schedule is as follows (all times CT):
Saturday, December 29
Session 1 - 9:30 am
Session 2 - 7 pm
Sunday, December 30
Session 3 - 12 pm
Session 4 - 7 pm
Fans can watch the tournament on FloWrestling ($) and live scoring will be on TrackWrestling.
Teams from many different schools will be competing as follows: Air Force, Arizona State, Army, Bloomsburg, Brown, Bucknell, Buffalo, Cal Poly, Campbell, Central Michigan, Chicago, Cumberlands (Ky.), Elmhurst, Franklin & Marshall, Fresno State, Harvard, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Johnson & Wales, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mount Union, North Carolina, Northern Illinois, Northern Iowa, Northwestern, Old Dominion, Oregon State, Penn, Princeton, South Dakota State, Wheaton, and Wisconsin.
Last season, Zahid Valencia won his second consecutive Midlands Championship at 174 lbs. and the Sun Devils had five placewinners - Z. Valencia (1st), Josh Shields (2nd), Tanner Hall (2nd), Anthony Valencia (4th), and Jason Tsirtsis (5th) - the most for the Sun Devils since 1997 when they had six and third-most all-time. Zahid Valencia earned the third-most points for his team amongst the field (28 points) while Oliver Pierce had the second-most pins in the least time (3/7:34). Valencia also became the 15th individual title winner at Midlands for ASU and just the third to win multiple titles.
Arizona State's Midlands Champions
1987 – Dan St. John (158)
1988 – Thom Ortiz (150), Dan St. John (158)
1989 – Zeke Jones (118), Andrew McNaughton (134), Thom Ortiz (142), Ray Miller (158), Dan St. John (167)
1995 – Markus Mollica (167)
1996 – Casey Strand (167), Aaron Simpson (177)
2001 – Eric Larkin (141)
2016 – Zahid Valencia (174), Tanner Hall (HWT)
2017 – Zahid Valencia (174)