Welcome to Bloodround Wrestling! We are a website for all things wrestling including news, features, results, and a weekly podcast. Thanks for visiting!

The Legacy of KCs in the sport of Wrestling

/

I hinted at this vanity piece a little while back, and what better time than now. Before I start writing actual pieces of content for Intermat, let’s have some fun with discussing some of my favorite people in wrestling with the greatest initials ever put together. K and C. These letters are so perfectly matched, that people just adopted KC as the name ‘Casey’. In this case though, we are focusing specifically on the initials KC and not the name Casey (my apologies Casey Cunningham and Cassandra ‘Casey’ Baranoski). Also, anyone reading this thinks of anyone I may have missed, please let me know. I’ll consider their resume and potentially add them to this forever growing document of exceptional people. Shoutout to Jason Bryant and his ever expanding NCAA Wrestling Almanac. He helped me compile this list, and has helped with many other aspects of covering wrestling. As always, your help is truly appreciated. Let’s begin!

Honorable Mentions; Cary Kolat and Cole Konrad. These should be switched. I can make the argument that if you switch the letters in their first and last names that they could have been better. Regardless, both of these guys are 2x NCAA Champions, and had solid international careers. Did you know that Cole Konrad was the first Bellator Heavyweight Champion? I didn’t either until now, but a cool piece of information.

Kendall Coleman - Purdue’s 157 pound wrestler over the last couple of years. He burst on the scene in the COVID year, but was the 5 seed at the NCAA tournament that year. The next year he ended up getting hurt at NCAAs ending his season. Last year he just started wrestling before the year started, as discussed with me here; insert article. He didn’t finish the year in the fashion that he intended, but a lot of people didn’t last year. Guess what, it was really hard to get on the podium in the toughest year of all time. KC is a beast though, and his mental toughness will help him come back and battle to get on the podium next season. KC’s are gritty dudes. Mark my words.

Kendall Cross - Did you know that he is the only Olympic medalist with these initials from any country? You know now! If you’re going to win a medal, you might as well make it gold, which is also cool. Kendall was a guest on Bloodround episode 334 and also I wrote about some of his more awesome matches and career highlights, which you can access by clicking the image of him below. Kendall also has some of the more iconic wrestling shoes out there with the Kendall Cross Adistars, which he wore while winning his aforementioned Olympic Gold Medal.

Kyle Crutchmer - An absolute beast at Oklahoma State, and now currently destroying jackasses in cage fights. I feel like fighting Kyle Crutchmer in a cage should be an acceptable form of punishment. We the jury find you guilty on all charges. You’re sentenced to 3 five minute rounds in the Octagon with Kyle Crutchmer, and you have to pay a $2,000.00 fine. KC was also a guest on our podcast, and was very fun to talk to. He was very candid and gave us one of my favorite John Smith stories that I’ve ever heard. Crutchmer is an absolute beast, so much so that even without these awesome initials, I would still be a huge fan. 2x Big 12 champion and a 2x All American for the Cowboys. As I finish this part, KC just beat the hell out of Michael Lombardo for three rounds. Sources say that Michael signed up for this fight, and it wasn’t a punishment of some sort. It looked like one.

Kyle Cerminara - MACtion pride baby! KC was Buffalo’s first All American in D1 history taking 8th at the 2004 NCAA tournament. He did it in very KC fashion as well. He drew the 2 seed first round, lost, then ended up battling his way through the backside of the bracket in a truly gritty fashion. His backside run started easily enough with a pin. Then he won in OT, then 3-2, then in the Bloodround winning 2-1 in tie breakers, before eventually falling once more to the same guy he wrestled in the first round of the tournament. KC’s… gritty SOBs, and he showcased this very well in this tournament in 2004.

Kevin Claunch - Ann Arbor Pioneer Novice Tournament Champion, co-host of the Bloodround wrestling podcast, bald, Mario Kart 64 expert, Karaoke enthusiast, Intermat Big Ten Conference correspondent, father of 3, Van Halen fan, CMU Alumni, and writer of this. My wrestling career as an athlete wasn’t tremendous by any means, but it was a blast and got me hooked enough to do what this stuff is. I hope that when it’s all said and done that I can end up contributing more to the sport than it gave to me, but I’ve got a long way to go.

Killian Cardinale - The first time I remember watching Killian compete was in the MAC finals against Drew Hildebrandt while Killian was competing for ODU (the year before Michael McGee beat Drew in the MAC finals I believe, also wrestling for ODU… Man they really screwed up getting rid of that program). He has since moved on to West Virginia University where he became an All American a year ago, and just recently won a Big 12 title. He lost in the Bloodround this season, but showing up seeded 5th is an indication that he’s kind of a badass. Also he rocks cornrows sometimes, which I feel like I would try if I had hair. He has a really under appreciated hair situation going on. Let’s draw light to that.

Kirk Crittendon - One of the excellent content creators with IA Wrestle, and a great dude to get some in between session beers with. Some people say that his wrestling career ended because he was too good, and it isn’t in the best interest of society to not have someone so dangerous walking around wrestling tournaments. Since retiring from wrestling humans, he has won several animal tournaments. Rumor has it that he beat an African elephant in the finals of a tournament once. He’s moving on from planet earth and is now looking to join some intergalactic tournaments. In fact, I motion that we all refer to him as Captain Kirk from now on.

Kizhan Clarke - Going from a 15 seed to the NCAA Finals is not an easy path. Tony Ramos asked me if that was the highest seed to make the NCAA Finals, and I didn’t know at the time. However, thanks to Jason Bryant once again, I have learned that since going to the expanded seeding system (they used to just seed 1-16 until recently), Kizhan is the highest seed to make the finals. Ronnie Perry made the finals for Lock Haven as a 15 seed, but that was before expanding the seeding. Anyway, I learned of Kizhan’s abilities when he was kicking butt for American University before transferring to North Carolina to finish his career. I also read about how he is a pretty remarkable student athlete; https://goheels.com/news/2021/12/8/wrestling-clarke-juggles-success-on-the-mat-and-in-the-classroom.aspx. Law School at UNC seems tough, also making the NCAA finals. Thankfully KC has the initials necessary to achieve these goals.

Kelsey Campbell - 2012 Olympic Trials I attended in Iowa City. It was a blast! At this particular Olympic Trials, KC defeated HM (Helen Maroulis) to make the Olympic team. She also won the trials in 2016, but didn’t compete because that weight class wasn’t qualified for the Olympics. According to her Wikipedia, she got into wrestling as a result of a bet from someone who bet that she couldn’t handle being a wrestler. I’ve never related with someone so immediately. That’s so KC.

Ken Chertow - What can be said about KC that hasn’t already been said over the years. Ken is a bit eccentric, but let’s not forget how impressive his career as an athlete was at times. KC was a 3x All American, a 1988 Olympian, and a Pan American Champion, all while wrestling in College at Penn State. You ever wonder if the person whose Wikipedia you’re reading is the same person updating that particular Wikipedia? That’s what happened here.

Kenny Courts - The 2015 Big Ten Championships was not the highlight of Kenny Courts season. He placed 8th, but at least it qualified him for the NCAA tournament. However, I believe that performance is what led him to placing 5th that year and helping the team to win a National Championship. KCs have a habit of trying to prove people wrong, and he certainly did that with his performance at NCAAs knocking off Hayden Zilmer, Brett Pfarr, and Matt McCutcheon to make the semi finals. As a native of Ann Arbor Michigan, I grew up not liking the Ohio State University. However, Wrestling has a way of looking past those things and respecting the athletes competing, regardless of singlet or school affiliation. I don’t know if other sports do this. I only really competed in wrestling, so that’s my frame of reference, but I feel like this is the sport where this sort of thing happens the most, or to the highest degree. KC was a tremendous competitor for the Ohio State University, and I’m happy to share initials with this man that I respect.

Kyle Conel - More MACtion pride! We can’t act like this is the first time that bigger schools have poached MAC standouts, and it won’t be the last. Conel almost beat Morgan McIntosh at NCAAs while still competing for Kent State (if I’m remembering correctly, this was the first round of NCAAs and the year that McIntosh was the 1 seed. I’m not fact checking this, just trusting my memory of things that I shouldn’t remember). Then I think he walked away from the sport for a year. Then he came back and had an unremarkable regular season… THEN HE PLACED 3rd IN THE COUNTRY. By all accounts he’s the strongest dude who ever existed. That makes sense, because KC’s are wicked strong.

Kirtland (Daniel) Cormier - Yesterday I learned that Kirtland is “Daniel” Cormier’s first name. I bet you didn’t think this piece was going to be educational did you? DC, as he is affectionately known, is a certified badass and first ballot hall of fame UFC athlete and wrestler. NCAA finalist, and you could make the argument that if he hadn’t faced off in the finals against the single greatest college wrestler of all time, he may have won a title. He also was an Olympian, which was badass. I’ll continue to refer to you as DC in public Daniel, but in my heart, you’ll always be KC.

KC, excuse me. DC seems like the right place to end this list of KCs. It’s a proud list of people who seem to be born with chips on their shoulders. Doubters to silence. It’s like they learn instinctively that these initials leave them with something to prove. If for no other reason than to spite the haters. Well haters, what can I tell you? We’re gritty, and we’ll always come through.