Nobody can accuse Chris Pendleton of ducking the strongest competition around.

The fifth-year Oregon State wrestling coach has his Beavers scheduled to face seven top-25 teams in dual meets this season — five at home.

“It’s as tough as anybody’s schedule in America,” assistant coach Josh Rhoden says. “It’s a mountain to climb.”

If so, Pendleton has his crampons and ice axe out, ready to lead the charge.

“We are always looking to wrestle the best teams we can,” Pendleton says.

“That will never change. We are not going to live in a house of cards.”

It all starts with the season opener Saturday, November 2, at Gill Coliseum, when Oregon State plays host to Iowa. The Hawkeyes, who finished fifth at last season’s NCAA Championships, are ranked No. 2 this season by Intermat and No. 4    by Wrestlestat.

Last season, top-ranked Penn State came to Corvallis and waxed Oregon State 36-3 before a standing-room-only crowd of 8,503. Trey Munoz was OSU’s only winner, but two other Beavers came within a hair of victory against the Nittany Lions, who went on to win the NCAA title. The previous season, attendance was more than 6,700 as the Beavers fell to 12th-ranked Oklahoma State 20-12.

“You have seen the last couple of years, when we face the best, we dig deep and give ‘em hell,” Pendleton says.

Iowa beat Oregon State 25-11 in a dual meet at Iowa City last season. Seven of the 10 Hawkeyes who will compete in Corvallis are among the top 10 in their weight class in Wrestlestat’s rankings, including senior Stephen Buchanan, an Oklahoma transfer ranked No. 1 at 197 pounds. Senior Kyle Parco (149) and junior Michael Caliendo (165) are ranked No. 2, senior Jacori Teener (157) is ranked No. 3 and junior Drake Ayala (125) is ranked No. 4.

Oregon State, meanwhile, has only three wrestlers in Wrestlestat’s individual rankings: Senior Trey Munoz No. 3 at 197, senior Matt Olguin No. 16 at 165 and junior Maximo Renteria No. 33 at 125. Olguin, however, is expected to redshirt this season as he rehabs from knee surgery.

Pendleton’s goal for attendance at the Iowa meet: 10,000. I covered the Penn State meet last year and told the coach he couldn’t have squeezed another body in the arena.

“That attendance figure (8,503) seemed a little bit off,” Pendleton says. “The number had to have been higher. We didn’t see an empty seat in the house. We are excited to wrestle in front of another big crowd against Iowa.”

The previous two years, the “big” meets were scheduled when the students were off campus because of the Christmas break. This season, Iowa and Oklahoma State (November 17) are scheduled with school in session.

“It’s a chance to have marquis matches with our student body on hand,” Pendleton says. “I hope they come out and support us. We are going to be doing some cool, innovative things with our dual meets and putting on a little more for the game-day atmosphere — shutting down Beaver street, getting souvenir tents and food carts set up.”

Last season, the Beavers had only three home duals. This season, they have six, including meets with Oklahoma State (ranked No. 2 by Wrestlestat), Stanford (No. 19), North Carolina (No. 27) and Wyoming (No. 31). Oregon State also has road duals scheduled at Ohio State (No. 3), Arkansas Little Rock (No. 21) and Cal Poly (No. 34).

Wrestlestat ranks Oregon State only 39th, though Intermat has the Beavers — who play host to the Pac-12 Championships on March 6 — at No. 24 in its dual-meet rankings.

“I don’t pay attention to that kind of stuff,” Pendleton sniffs. “I don’t know if we have ever had a favorable ranking to begin a season. If that’s where we have to start, so be it. Our job is to concern ourselves with development and getting better.”

After claiming the Pac-12 championship in 2023, Oregon State finished third a year ago and was 23rd at the NCAA Championships. OSU loses four seniors off that team — Brandon Kaylor at 125, Cleveland Belton at 141, Travis Wittlake at 174 and Boone McDermott at heavyweight.

This year’s team will be young and inexperienced, with Olguin — the 2023 Pac-12 champion — and sophomore Justin Rademacher (197) redshirting. Rademacher, who earned a bronze medal at the U20 World Championships in Pontevedra, Spain, this past summer, will train this season and wrestle unattached while retaining a year of eligibility as Munoz moves up from 184 to 197. On November 8 and 9, Rademacher will compete at the Bill Farrell Memorial International at the New York Athletic Club for a berth on the U.S. squad for the World Freestyle Championships.

Munoz, meanwhile, will focus on going out with a bang in his senior season. He looked lean and mean in swamping redshirt freshman Vaun Halstead 19-4 in Tuesday night’s wrestle-off at Gill.

“We talked after last season, and Trey wanted to move up to 197 this year,” Pendleton says. “He has put on quite a bit of size. I’m watching him against our bigger guys in practice and he has looked good.

Munoz, a three-time Pac-12 champ at 184, was third at the NCAA Championships a year ago. His father, Mark Munoz, moved up from 184 to 197 and won an NCAA Championship at Oklahoma State in 2001 after placing third at 184 as a junior.

“It would be poetic if Trey were to follow in his father’s footsteps,” Rhoden says.

Munoz’s first match of the season will be against Iowa’s Buchanan, a three-time All-American and ranked No. 1 at 197.

“Trey is going to wrestle a lot of top-10 guys throughout the season,” OSU assistant Nate Engel says. “He believes he can win the national championship. Our job is to help him break through and get to the top of the podium. Trey is going to do Trey things this season. He will lay it on the line every match.”

A weight-by-weight look at the Beavers in 2024-25:

125: A year ago, Renteria was an Illinois transfer wrestling behind senior Brandon Kaylor. Renteria went 6-0 in his limited duty and beat Arizona State’s Richard Figueroa, who would go on to an NCAA title. Intermat has Renteria ranked only No. 27.

“Max is focused and looks the best he has ever looked on the mat,” Engel says. “He thinks he is going to be a national champion this year, and it won’t surprise me if he does it.”

Says Pendleton: “Getting to watch Max and BK wrestle a lot last season has shown me that Max is right there. Now it is getting him to believe in himself as he gets the opportunity to wrestle some of the best in the country. I don’t think he is scared of that challenge. He has had to change his lifestyle, dedication and commitment, and he has done that with flying colors.”   

Behind him are freshmen Hunter Taylor, a three-time Missouri state champion, and Roseburg’s Gage Singleton, last season’s 6A state champ at 113. “They will both be great for our future,” Rhoden says.

133: The incumbent is Gabe Whisenhunt, the sophomore from Crescent Valley High who was 12-11 last season, including an upset of then No. 4-ranked Sam Latona of Virginia Tech. But sophomore Damion Elliott beat Whisenhunt 4-1 in Tuesday’s wrestle-off so should get to compete against Iowa.

141: Sophomore Nash Singleton, Gage’s older brother, was 19-12 and placed fourth in the Pac-12 Championships last season wrestling mostly at 149.

“Due to injury (to Nolan Tolentino), Nash stepped up and did a good job for us at 149, but this is his true weight class,” Pendleton says. “Nash is a guy who once the whistle blows is like Rocky Balboa. He will swing haymakers until there is one guy left standing. I think he’s jumped a level (in ability) and is ready for this season.”

Says Rhoden: “Holy smokes, Nate has looked really good (in practice). He is capable of going against the best in the country.”

Singleton earned the nod to wrestle the Iowa match, but not by much. In Tuesday night’s wrestle-off, he had to rally from a 6-2 deficit to beat junior Chase DeBlaere 8-6, scoring a takedown inside the final 20 seconds to win.

149: Sophomore Noah Tolentino (3-0) missed most of last season after an ACL knee injury the first week of the season. Now he is out for the short term with a concussion. Junior Victor Jacinto, a transfer from Clackamas CC who was third at the NJCAA Championships a year ago, will wrestle against Iowa after defeating Ayden Garver 7-3 Tuesday night. Garver is a sophomore who was a four-time state champion at Newberg High.

157: Sophomore C.J. Hamblin (4-5, fifth in the Pac-12 last season) beat Ethan Stiles 8-5 in overtime Tuesday night to secure his spot against Iowa. Stiles is a redshirt freshman transfer who was 15-3 at Nebraska last season. The Beavers also have junior Steele Starren, a junior transfer from Clackamas who was the 2023 NJCAA champion.

165: With Olguin redshirting, it is a close battle between seniors Kekana Fouret (13-10) and Mason Reiniche (16-9) and sophomore Murphy Menke (8-5). Fouret defeated Menke 8-5 in overtime Tuesday night to claim the spot on opening night against the Hawkeyes.

174: Senior Sean Harman, a transfer who was 32-18 against D1 competition in five seasons with Missouri, looked strong in handling junior Grant Gambrall 11-2 Tuesday night. Harman was a two-time state champion at West Linn High. Engel was an assistant coach at Navy when Sean’s older brother, Ryan, wrestled there.

“Sean has beaten some top-20 kids,” Engel says. “He wanted to come home and finish his career. He is a leader on and off the mat.”

184: There is a close competition between redshirt freshman TJ McDonnell (7-7) and senior Mason Christiansen (6-5). McDonnell beat Christiansen two of three matches Tuesday to gain a spot against Iowa.

HEAVYWEIGHT: Senior Brett Mower beat junior Charley Hastriter 8-3 in Tuesday’s wrestle-off, but they are likely warming the spot for freshman Aden Attao, who could be a future star. The 6-foot, 265-pound Boise, Idaho native, who turned 20 last week, is a two-time U20 World bronze medalist and U20 U.S. Greco-Roman national champion who was third at the 2024 U.S. Olympic trials.

In the semifinals of the 2024 U20 Freestyle Championships, he led Iowa freshman Ben Kueter until the closing seconds, losing by one point. Kueter is No. 16 in the college heavyweight rankings. Attao is recovering from elbow surgery and is expected to make his college debut sometime in January.

“The kid just likes to come out and wrestle, to let it fly,” Pendleton says. “He is fearless.”

The Beavers will almost certainly take their lumps against the stronger teams during the dual-meet season. Even so, Engel has high goals.

“I think we can finish in the top 10 at nationals,” the OSU assistant says. “Four All-Americans and two national championships is a reasonable goal. I think we have a better team than last year.”

Rhoden believes all the stiff competition through the season — which includes tournaments at Annapolis, Md., Reno and Las Vegas — will bode well for the Beavers.

“We will have done a good job getting our guys in front of big crowds and in high-pressure situations, so they can get used to those kind of things going into the Pac-12s and NCAAs,” he says. “But we are younger and a little more inexperienced than we have been the last couple of years. We are going to find out quickly what we are made of.”

Pendleton is all about improvement from the first meet to the last.

“I want to see us have incremental growth, to challenge ourselves, to be excited about the daunting schedule,” he says. “We don’t have to worry about wins and losses. It is about going out and putting our best foot forward and getting better. That has been a staple of what we have done in my time here.

“I feel really good about where the program is going. We had a good recruiting class this year, we are looking at a (2025) class that is top four in the country, and we are not done yet. We are going to be adding some people. The long-term goal is to have a top-10 team every year.”

With the defection of Arizona State and Stanford to the Big 12 and ACC, respectively, the Pac-12 is left with four teams — Oregon State, Arkansas Little Rock, Cal Poly and Cal Bakersfield. The Pac-12 must add at least two schools before next season or lose its automatic spots into the NCAA Tournament.

Pendleton says Pac-12 officials are working behind the scenes to line up schools that could join the conference. He declined to say which ones might be candidates, but some possibilities are North Dakota State, South Dakota State, Wyoming, Utah Valley, Cal Baptist, Northern Colorado and Northern Iowa.

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