After wrestling his way to a USA Wrestling Senior National semifinal appearance in the 65-kilogram men’s freestyle bracket, Iowa’s Jaydin Eierman stumbled to a fifth-place finish on the weekend.

On Saturday afternoon, Eierman defeated All-American Matthew Kolodzik via 6-5 decision in the quarterfinal round to advance to a semifinal matchup with No. 3 Evan Henderson. The 28-year old Henderson dominated Eierman throughout the match, winning 13-5.

Having lost out on his chance to be crowned a USA Wrestling Senior National Champion, Eierman returned to Xtream Arena in Coralville, Iowa, to wrestle in the consolation bracket Sunday. However, the three-time All-American did not find the success he was looking for.

Wrestling for a berth in the third-place match, Eierman fell to No. 1 Joey McKenna in the consolation semifinals. Once again, Eierman lost in blowout fashion. McKenna earned a technical fall over “The Riddler”  in just two minutes and 23 seconds.

Following his loss to McKenna, Eierman had one last chance to make good on the day in a rematch with Kolodzik for fifth place.

The rematch between the two NCAA All-Americans wasn’t much of a match at all. As opposed to their hotly-contested first match, the rematch ended quickly and decisively as Eierman pinned Kolodzik in one minute and nine seconds.

Overall, Eierman went 5-2 in two days of action, accumulating two wins by technical and two wins by fall.

Eierman will hit the mat at Xtream Arena again on Nov. 1 for the Hawkeye Wresting Club Showdown Open.

“[Preseason events] are all going to help me,” Eierman said. “It’s going to give me, not really a scale of where I’m at, but kind of show like how our training has been paying off.”

Jeremiah Moody was the other Hawkeye Wrestling Club member competing at Senior Nationals over the weekend, but he was eliminated Saturday and thus did not compete Sunday.

On the weekend, Moody lost twice by technical fall and won once by 9-7 decision.

Even without Hawkeye Wrestling Club representation in the Senior National finals, Big Ten Conference wrestlers still made their presence felt.

Recently-graduated Ohio State Buckeye and reigning Big Ten Champion Kollin Moore won the 97-kilogram finale, defeating former Iowa State Cyclone and NCAA National Champion Kyven Gadson via 12-5 decision.

Moore was actually seeded first at 197-pounds for the 2020 NCAA Men’s Division I Wrestling Championships. Unfortunately for Moore, COVID-19 denied him the opportunity to cap of his senior season and Buckeye career with an exclamation mark.

“I don’t think anything can make up for not being able to wrestle my last NCAA Tournament,” Moore said. “I think that tournament is very special, very unique. This definitely proved to me that I’ve been doing the right things. I didn’t let it distract me, get me down, or lead me down the wrong path. It’s good to see that I stayed on the right path and stuck it out. I finally got a big win here.”

Mason Parris was the other Big Ten wrestler to be crowned a Senior National Champion Sunday. The Michigan heavyweight beat Arizona State’s Tanner Hall by technical fall in one minute and 23 seconds.

According to Parris, wrestling the Big Ten Conference helped prepare him for the moment.

“You know how great the competition the Big Ten has, especially at heavyweight,” Parris said. “So, it’s like really taught me to compete really hard and compete with the best guys out there. It’s really helped me refine myself, develop everything that I have. It’s just really great competition.”

With USA Wrestling’s 2020 Senior Nationals now in the books, so too is Xtream Arena’s first major event. Although it was only filled to 25 percent capacity and bogged down by a number of stringent medical protocols, the arena and the Iowa wrestling fans it held still met expectation.

“The arena is actually perfect for an event like this,” Moore said. “It’s the perfect size. If there were eight or ten mats like there usually are for a U.S. Open, I think it would feel a lot like the NCAA national tournament. It’s in Iowa, which is always a great place to wrestle, they have great fans. It’s close to a lot of people around the Big Ten. It’s close to people out west, so a lot of people come. The facility is incredible.

“This is the most warm up mats I think I’ve had at any wrestling event ever. Usually, you get two mats for the whole tournament and everyone is on top of each other, and it’s impossible to stay warm. I think there’s ten or twelve mats [in GreenState Family Fieldhouse]. It’s incredible. This has been, surprisingly, a really nice event. It was run well and the arena is really nice.”