Wrestling Fans Will Miss Publication This Month

The absence of Nebraska Wrestling Illustrated's unprecedented bracket-to-bracket coverage of the Nebraska State Wrestling Tournament will almost certainly be felt by fans of the sport later this month.

NWI ceased operations last October with E-Publisher Michael J. Carnes citing increasing demands on his time for family and personal matters.

"With the amount of personal commitments we both have with our family and careers, it just has become more than we are capable of continuing at the level we had established," Carnes said in a statement on the publication's website. "(Business partner) Kevin Dill and I both are of the belief that the wrestling community of this state deserves a much stronger commitment than either of us are able to continue, and therefore we felt it was time to say good-bye and shut things down."

Carnes, a veteran sports writer, and Dill, a graphic designer, teamed together to start NWI in 2000. In a short time, the magazine developed an immense following which led to more than 200,000 downloads of the magazine during the 2001 and 2002 seasons.

This year's State Wrestling Tournament is Feb. 15-17 at Qwest Center Omaha.