Area teams have outstanding days in IHSA wrestling regionals

Area wrestling teams had outstanding days at the IHSA wrestling regional tournaments in all three classes held Saturday, with Class 3A teams taking part in the Quincy Regional, Class 2A teams at the Triad Regional in Troy and Class 1A teams at the Belleville Althoff Regional, with teams seeking to advance to the Team Sectional tournaments to be held later in the month and individual wrestlers attempting to move on to individual sectional tournaments set for various locations this Friday and Saturday, with a goal of reaching the IHSA individual state tournaments at Urbana-Champaign's State Farm Center at the University of Illinois campus the weekend of Feb. 18-20.

Here is a look at the results from each of the regional tournaments:

CLASS 3A QUINCY REGIONAL

Edwardsville went to the Quincy Regional at Quincy High School Saturday, with 11 of the Tiger wrestlers finishing among the top three wrestlers in their weight classes to advance to this weekend's Bolingbrook Sectional in suburban Chicago. Alton also advanced six of their wrestlers to Bolingbrook and Granite City will send three wrestlers to the individual sectional.

“We had a great day,” said Tiger coach Jon Wagner. “We had our guys advance into the second round, and that's where we managed to put it away. I certainly wuld have liked to have some better results from the championship matches, but we did have two champions and I'm really proud of everyone; it's a testament to their hard work and dedication that helped get them this far. We had great efforts from everyone all day.”

Edwardsville's performance gave them their fifth straight regional title and an automatic spot in the Team Sectional tournament later in the month, the Tigers scoring 203.5 points to win going away, with O'Fallon finishing second with 130.5 points. Collinsville was third with 127.5 points, Alton fourth at 111.5, Belleville West fifth at 95.5, Granite City sixth at 82.5, Pekin seventh at 44.5 and Belleville West eighth at 30.

The Tigers had two champions on the day and took part in 10 finals to help them get to their point total. Freshman Noah Surtin won the title at 106, defeating O'Fallon's Alek Ziegler 3-0 to take the crown; EHS' other title came from senior Chris Prosser at 170, defeating Collinsville's Zach Hammell-Brown in a 16-1 technical fall.

Yancey Jaleen took second at 120, dropping a 6-5 decision to Collinsville's Jevonn Pedigo in the final, with Ben Schlueter finishing second at 126 in a 15-0 technical fall to Belleville West's Garrett Bass; Rafael Roman dropping a 5-0 decision to Quincy's Michael Peters at 138; Baylor Montgomery taking a 17-2 technical fall loss to Alton's Alejandro Lopez at 145; Guy Brown taking an injury default defeat to Belleville West's Nick Foster at 152; Mason Taylor falling to Granite City's Kyle Thompson 3-2 in the 160 final; James Watters being defeated 15-9 in the 195 final by O'Fallon's Kobey Bosworth; and Bobby Burnside being defeated by Granite City's Korinithian Nabors in a 4-1 decision in the 285 title bout.

In third-place bouts, Deontae Yancey dropped a 5-1 decision to O'Fallon's Alex Fulton at 113; Yancey Devion falling 7-2 to Belleville West's Justin Koderhandt at 132; and Gabe Jackson won the third-place bout over Collinsville's Russell March 11-2 at 182.

For the Redbirds, Connor Broyles took the title at 138 with a 16-0 technical fall over Jacob Blaha of Collinsville; Lopez claimed first at 145; and KeOntay Holmes won the 182 title bout over O'Fallon's Mason Hewitt with a 4-3 decision. In third-place bouts, Garrett Sims defeated Quincy's Andrew Sanchez at 106 with a 4-0 decision; Nolan Wosczynski dropped a 3-2 decision to O'Fallon's Nick Kelly; Keyondrick Russell took third at 195 with a 10-2 win over Quincy's Tommy Pickett Jr.; and Alecquan Russell finished third at 220 with a 7-3 win over Collinsville's Jarod Estes.

In first-place bouts for the Warriors, Thompson emerged victorious over Edwardsville's Taylor at 140 and Nabors defeated Edwardsville's Burnside at 285. In third-place bouts involving Granite City wrestlers, Josh Harsh dropped a 10-8 decision to Pekin's Blake Harris at 120, while Wilyonde Bell fell to Collinsville's Cole Zabata 5-0 at 138; and Andre Weathers defeated O'Fallon's Jake DeLange 8-2 at 170.

CLASS 2A TRIAD REGIONAL

Civic Memorial had two wrestlers and Jersey had three wrestlers move on to this weekend's Mahomet-Seymour individual sectional near Champaign-Urbana by finishing among the top three in their weight class; Cahokia won the team championship with 209.5 points, with the host Knights second at 131; Waterloo was third at 114; Highland fourth at 91; Jacksonville fifth at 75; East St. Louis sixth at 74; the Panthers seventh at 64; the Eagles eighth at 55; and Mascoutah ninth at 43.

The Eagles advancing to the individual sectional were Hudson Brown at 113, who was defeated by Cahokia's Tevion Moore in a 5:23 pin in the third-place bout; Zach Brundeen at 120, who was pinned in 1:22 by Jacksonville's Jocelyn Murphy in the third-place bout; Brandon Carpenter at 182, who defeated Waterloo's Kory Schaefer in the championship bout in a 3:24 pin; and Jordan Stagner at 195, who fell to Triad's John McKinney 9-2 in the title bout.

Panthers qualifying for the sectional were Brandon Critchfield at 132, who dropped a 5-1 decision to Merik Fulton of Triad in the title bout; Dylan Torrey at 138, who defeated Walterloo's Dalton Viglasky in a 3:16 pin in the title bout; Jamikah Toney at 152, who dropped a 13-2 decision to Cahokia's Rozell Baker in the third-place bout; and Cody Vinyard at 220, who won the third-place bout with a 1:24 pin of Cahokia's Jacob Bullock.

CLASS 1A BELLEVILLE ALTHOFF REGIONAL

East Alton-Wood River had a very good day at the Belleville Althoff Class 1A Regional, advancing six Oiler wrestlers into this weekend's Carterville individual sectional. Roxana also had nine wrestlers move on to the sectional, and Metro East Lutheran had two wrestlers move on to the sectional tournament.

“Everyone really worked hard all day,” said Oiler coach Dave Sobol. “The kids really worked for everything they got, and it means a lot to the program that we had so many kids advance to the sectional. We have a philosophy to wrestle every match one period at a time and the kids really did great.

“I'm really proud of all the kids; it's a credit to their perseverance and their work ethic. We just took everything one period at a time and we did really, really well. They all did a really nice job.”

The host Crusaders took the team title with 145 points, with Pittsfield second at 129; the Shells were third at 126, the Oilers fourth at 122; Carlinville took fifth with 115, Mount Olive was sixth at 68, the Knights seventh with 34 and Freeburg eighth at 18 points.

Drew Sobol led the way for the Oilers with a first-place finish at 106, pinning Pittsfield's Noah Booth in 49 seconds to claim the championship. In other EA-WR title bouts, Zac Blosioli won the 152 title bout over Mount Olive's Jonny Darrah with a 19-8 decision and Zac Kincade pinned Pittsfield's Christian Beck in 1:40 to take the crown at 195; Jon Wright also won the title at 220 when he defeated Roxana's Owen Robinson 4-0 in the championship bout.

In third-place bouts, Austin Hammond missed out on a chance to advance when he was pinned in 3:40 by Carlinville's Nate Burns at 120, but Chris Staggs moved into the sectional with a 3-1 win over Althoff's Grace Kristoff for third place at 132; Jake Erlson won his way to the sectional with a 4:41 pin of Pittsfield's Nate Hoover at 160, but Adam Copeland missed out on advancing when Carlinville's Dan Card pinned him in 4:32 at 220.

In title bouts for the Shells, Blake Whyers dropped a 16-1 technical fall decision to Althoff's Chase Bittle at 120, while Jarod Foiles won the crown at 132 when he took an 8-5 decision from Carlinville's Kyle Dixon; Althoff's Jarrid Braunagel took a 12-7 decision over the Shells' Alex Maguire to win the 138 championship; Drew Huff fell to Althoff's Zac Baraunagel in 54 seconds in the 170 title bout; Brett Nyswonger won at 220 with a 3:19 pin of Althoff's Gage Rainey; and Robinson fell in the 285 title bout to Wright.

In third-place bouts, David Akeman was awarded a bye for third at 113; James Henesler was eliminated when he was pinned in 5:47 by Pittsfield's Joel Cook at 126; Logan Carpenter was eliminated by Althoff's Austin Carey when Carey recorded a 21-6 technical fall win at 152; and Tyriek Holmes was awarded a bye at 195 to advance.

For MEL, their two wrestlers who moved on included Edward Prenzler, who dropped a injury default decision to Carlinville's Jacob Dixon in the 160 title bout; and Christian Downs, who defeated Althoff's Jacob Shields with a 1:36 pin in the 182 third-place bout.

(Photos courtesy of Vince Schlueter)

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