Illinois (12-5) took to the mat at the Big Ten Championships on March 7–8, battling the conference’s best inside Penn State’s Bryce Jordan Center. The Illini finished sixth with 78.0 team points. Leading the way, redshirt sophomore Kannon Webster earned a bronze medal at 157 pounds, defeating Ohio State redshirt sophomore Brandon Cannon 9–2 in the third-place match.
In addition to Webster, seven Illini qualified for the NCAA Championships. In their final season, graduate students Spencer Moore, Luces Byrd and Luke Luffman will be competing at 125, 133, and 285 pounds, respectively. Redshirt sophomores Michael Gioffre (149 pounds), Braedon Scoles (165 pounds) and Chris Moore (184 pounds), and redshirt freshman Colin Kelly (174 pounds) will join the trio at Championships next week.
Webster opened with a pin over Northwestern freshman Ty Wilson. Webster followed with a 14-2 major decision against Charlie Millard, redshirt freshman at Minnesota.
This set the stage for the semifinal matchup against freshman PJ Duke of Penn State. After nearly having a pivotal takedown during the first period, but running out of time, Webster secured it and ended in a 4-2 decision. Prior to the bronze medal match, Webster won via injury default over Indiana redshirt sophomore Bryce Lowery.
In a major upset, Webster defeated Cannon, who was ranked No. 1 by the National Wrestling Coaches Association in January 2026. He has now medaled in two consecutive Big Ten Championships, following last year’s upset silver-medal finish at 149 pounds.
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Byrd fell in his quarterfinal match, but bounced back through the rest of the consolation bracket. However, he had a sudden loss to Iowa senior Drake Ayala in the consolation semifinals, 4-1. Avenging his quarterfinals loss in a 5-2 decision over Purdue redshirt senior Blake Boarman, he secured fifth place and has now finished top-5 in all five of his career Big Ten Championship appearances.
After winning two of his three duals on the first day of competition, Gioffre finished in sixth place, falling to Michigan graduate student Lachlan McNeil in the consolation semifinals, 8-3. Gioffre was later defeated by Joseph Zargo, redshirt senior at Wisconsin, 9-3, in the fifth-place match.
Moore earned fourth place after he advanced via the medical forfeit of Silas Allred, senior at Nebraska. In the consolation semifinals, Moore fell to Michigan redshirt freshman Brock Mantanona in sudden victory, 4-1. Kelly placed seventh at 174 pounds in his first Big Ten Championships when he beat Brody Baumann, redshirt junior at Purdue, for the second time during the weekend in an 11-5 decision.
“They won a lot of tough matches throughout the tournament,” said head coach Jeremy Hunter to Fighting Illini Athletics. “There’s a lot of things that we can look back to improve upon and make the changes for the next weekend.”
For the second consecutive season, eight Illinois national qualifiers will close out the season at the NCAA Championships. The competition will be held on March 19-21 in Cleveland, Ohio at Rocket Arena. This is the first time since the 2014-15 season that the program has sent eight or more qualifiers to NCAA Championships in back-to-back seasons.
