The Central Michigan wrestling team needed every one of its six wins Sunday as it squeezed out an 18-16 win against Old Dominion to close out its non-conference schedule.

The match was part of a dual-sport showing with the gymnastics team at McGuirk Arena, which ended with a pair of Chippewa victories. Athletes and coaches involved agreed that the “Royal Rumble and Tumble” was a success for both sports and the university’s athletics.

“I thought it was great,” said wrestling coach Tom Borrelli. “Hopefully, we created more fans in this community, and any time we can have that environment, it’s good for our whole athletic department.”

The arena was seemingly busier than most home matches, though Borrelli looked at the added distractions as a positive quality.

“The thing that really helps us is at the NCAA Tournament, the first two rounds, there’s eight mats. And so there’s a lot of stuff going on in the arena,” he said. “Your guys have got to learn how to focus in those situations to win at the tournament.”

No. 5 Ben Bennett kicked off the day with an 8-3 decision at the 174-pound match, scoring on two takedowns, a reversal and a riding time point to put CMU on the board first. Bennett was one of six CMU wrestlers to score points on riding time.

CMU (5-7, 1-0 MAC) continued to struggle at the 184-pound slot, watching Chad Friend fall to 1-13 on the season with a 5-1 decision to Joe Budi. The team won its next two matches at 197 and heavyweight, but the 9-3 lead wasn’t safe for the Chippewas.

“I was disappointed that the 174-weight class and heavyweight weight class didn’t score bonus points,” Borrelli said.

The strength of ODU’s lineup is its lower weight classes, and No. 4 ranked 125-pounder James Nicholson leads the Monarchs, coming into the contest with a perfect 23-0 record.

Nicholson played a game of catch and release with sophomore Christian Cullinan, scoring on takedowns and giving up escapes as he went on to win by a 15-5 major decision.

“We’re worrying too much about losing and not enough about attacking those guys,” Borrelli said. “I felt like we didn’t compete in some situations the way we would like to compete and I think we have a young team.”

What was possibly the most anticipated matchup of the day did not disappoint when No. 11 Scotti Sentes took on No. 12 Kyle Hutter. After a defensive stalemate through the first period, Sentes started on bottom in the second and recorded an escape and reversal to build a 3-0 lead. The third period allowed him to build up a 2:22 of riding and he held on to win by a 4-0 decision.

“I think I probably could have score more points, but I was more worried with what he was doing,” Sentes said. “I shut his offense down, but I wrestled to win and I should have been wrestling to improve my offense.”

ODU proved it wasn’t going to give up without a fight when Brennan Brumley pinned Scott Mattingly in 4:57 to give the Monarchs their first lead of the match.

Donnie Corby flipped the momentum of the match and maybe of his individual season with a 5-3 decision against Joey Metzler. The sophomore gave up an early takedown, but returned the favor in the closing seconds of the match and earned a riding time point to take the lead back.

“I was mad that I didn’t get the first takedown, but I felt very confident and then I started riding him on top and felt confident,” Corby said. “It felt really good because I’ve been in a slump lately, and it felt good to get that win.”

Corby improved to 18-13 this season, breaking his three-match losing streak.

Senior Ryan Cubberly sealed the match for the Chippewas with a win at the 157-pound weight class against a Micah Blair – an opponent his brother Eric knocked off Dec. 5th at the Nittany Lion Open.

The win marked CMU’s first streak of back-to-back wins this season, despite being without senior All-American Mike Miller.

“Mike’s had a number of injuries from the top of his head to the bottom of his toes,” Borrelli said. “Right now, he’s got a rib injury and we’re hopin to get him back towards the end of February.”

The team will travel to Athens, Ohio Friday as it looks to make a run at the MAC title for a tenth straight year.