PLYMOUTH – While other sports were busy rescheduling games and events on Saturday, several local wrestling programs took to the mat at Plymouth High School in hopes of sectional glory. While it was the host Pilgrims who captured their second consecutive team sectional title with a score of 258, a solid group of 20 individual wrestlers from the Kosciusko community made their own sectional glory.

Valley Advances Seven, Claims Two Titles

The Tippecanoe Valley Vikings came into Saturday’s sectional with a strong appetite and left not completely satisfied.

While the Vikings had a very strong showing, finishing third overall as a team with a score of 145, head coach Scott Smith saw some flaws in his team’s performance that he wants to see improved.

“Our movement could’ve been better,” started Smith. “I think having almost a week off made us pretty rusty. Last night we had a good practice and Thursday’s was okay. I just think this layover we had was way too long.”

Despite the long layover, Valley still managed to advance seven wrestlers and take bragging rights home in two weight classes.

Top-seeded Cody Runyon took first place for the Vikings in the 145-pound bracket after defeating Rochester’s Ben Horban in the championship round with a 7-4 decision. Not too long after Runyon’s victory, another top-seeded Vikings claimed a championship.

Viking sophomore Garrett Bell pinned two opponents on his way to the 170-pound championship where he would take first place with a 3-0 decision over Plymouth’s John Stillson.

Two other Vikings made the championship rounds but could not find the rights moves to claim first place.

Keaton Bell fell to Plymouth’s Aaron Houin in the 182-pound title tilt while top-seeded Devin Childers lost an exciting match to Plymouth’s Triston Rodiriguez in the 132-pound final.

Wyatt Nelson (138-pound) and Jaron Kidd (220) both finished third in their respective weight classes. Austin Nault finished fourth in a loaded 120-pound bracket to round out Valley’s regional qualifiers.

“Mentally, we were pretty good today,” said Smith. “We stayed focused and wanted to be out there. We just need to improve our movement before regional.”

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Tigers Pleased With Strong Sectional Showing

A lot was up in the air for the Warsaw wrestling team on Saturday. After a shaky regular season full of ups and downs, anything was possible.

A team score of 117.5 and a sixth place finish was right around where the Tigers expected to be, but advancing seven wrestlers to next weekend’s regional was more than Warsaw anticipated.

“I thought a good day for us would be getting five guys on to the regional,” started Warsaw head coach Justin Smith. “I was really happy with the way the guys wrestled today. Even the guys that didn’t get through wrestled very well today. We were just very happy with our guys today.”

The highlight on the day for the Tigers was their one and only champion, Kyle Hatch.

Hatch, a freshman came in as the top-seeded wrestler in the 106-pound weight class. Hatch dominated his first two matches by pinning Culver Military’s Joseph Henry in just 48 second in the first round. Hatch then won by tech fall over Caston’s Jacob Maroney. In the championship round Hatch would have to work for it but finally pinned Plymouth’s Eric Humphrey at the 3:47 mark.

Hatch was the only Tiger to participate in the championship round but Warsaw cleaned up in the consolation round.

Anthony Hendrickson battled his was back from a semi-final loss and defeated Triton’s Trevor Kanarr to claim third place at 195. Rory Nolin also took home a third place ribbon by pinning Rochester’s Taylor Pugh in the 182-pound third place match.

Jeremy Lee (126), Spencer Gariess (138), Lester Payne (220) and Anthony Penn (285) all took fourth place in their respective brackets to claim a spot in next week’s regional at Rochester.

Triton Doubles Its 2013 Output

After last year’s sectional the Triton wrestling team was pleased to advance three of its wrestlers to the regional round. This year the Trojans did not just up the ante, they doubled it.

Six Triton grapplers will get to show what they are made of in next week’s regional. None of the Trojans made the championship round but it was still a fantastic day for the program in the eyes of head coach Matt Arvesen.

“We did a really good job today at doing everything we worked on all week,” started Arvesen. “We had some matches where our guys beat a couple of kids that beat us earlier this year, that was great to see. It’s easy to see that we have made some great strides this season, especially in the past couple of weeks.”

Sophomore Gage Waddle was the only member of the Trojan 2014 team that had qualified for the 2013 regional. Last February Waddle claimed third place in the 138-pound bracket, this year Waddle built up the muscle and claimed another third place finish, this time at 160. Waddle defeated Plymouth’s Jeremy Splix 6-2.

In the 106-pound bracket it was Triton’s Malachi Greene that claimed third place honors with his 3-0 decision over Caston’s Jacob Maroney.

Justin Hefner was the only other Trojan to claim a third place finish. Hefner defeated Warsaw’s Anthony Penn 4-2 in the 285-pound third place match.

The Trojans junior class will be well-represented in Rochester next weekend a Grant Stichter (145), Nate Spangle (152) and Trevor Kanarr (195), all juniors, each finished fourth place in their respective brackets.

 

Wawasee Looks Ahead After Poor Showing

If you can’t beat them, join them, right? Except, you have to beat them in order to join them.

The Wawasee wrestling team had a tough time beating any of its opponents on Saturday afternoon and the end result was a team score of 32 point, good enough for ninth place. But the Warriors knew they would not favor well as a team at the Plymouth sectional, the goal from day one of the season was to get individuals on to the regional.

Perhaps it was fitting to have a disappointing end to a season that was never really full of good fortune. Not one Warrior wrestler managed to advance to next week’s regional at Rochester. It was a day that head coach Paul Meyer would just like to forget.

“What went wrong? That’s the million dollar question,” stated Meyer. “A lot of went wrong today can be linked back to what happened in the regular season.

“Sectional brackets are based on regular season success, it is all about seeding. When you have a poor seeding, you draw tougher opponents and that obviously makes it tougher to advance. When you wrestle a kid in sectional that you already wrestled in season, you have to beat them. No excuses.”

Meyer also mentioned injuries as an issue for the Warriors on Saturday. One key injury was the shoulder of Tristin Ponsler.

Ponsler, a sophomore, made it all the way to semi-state last season but did not even make the third-place match this year. Ponsler won his first match over Warsaw’s Kameron Hile with a 4-0 decision. In the semi-final round of the 120-pound bracket, Ponsler injured his shoulder in a 9-6 loss to Rochester’s Aaron Orr. Ponsler would be forced to forfeit his next match due the injury, effectively ending his season.

The Warriors had little to cheer about on Saturday but one moment can at least be described as bittersweet.

Warrior senior Michael Pena started his day strong with a pin of Bremen’s Ben Thornton. Pena then fell to Rochester’s Ben Horban in the 145-pound semi-final round. Facing elimination from regional qualification, Pena lost a hard fought match to Triton’s Grant Stichter. An emotional Pena was beside himself after the loss but pulled himself together for what would, in all likelihood, be the last match of his career.

Pena found himself pitted against Thornton yet again, this time with fifth place up for grabs. Pena repeated his earlier performance with another pin of the Bremen senior. Though it was not how he had it planned, Pena was able to end his career on a win.

Marcos Mejia was the only other Warrior to finish as high as fifth. Mejia pinned Bremen’s Damon Young at the 1:45 mark in the 126-pound fifth place match.

Wawasee ended this season on a low note but should return eight athletes from this year’s sectional team in hopes of a much more successful 2014-15 campaign.

Next week’s regional will be held at Rochester High School with matches starting at 9 a.m. on Saturday.