COLLINSVILLE – Edwardsville’s wrestling team opened their Southwestern Conference campaign in rather impressive fashion Thursday night, winning 11 of their 14 bouts on the night – eight of them by pinfall – to defeat Collinsville 57-12 at Fletcher Gym.
The win put the Tigers at 5-0 overall, 1-0 in the SWC.
“We wrestled very well,” said Tiger coach Jon Wagner. “Collinsville’s a very tough team; they wrestle very strong and physical and we overcame some adversity to win a couple of close matches.
“It was a good way to get ready for the (Ron Sauer) tournament this weekend. There’s going to be some really good teams there and it will be a very good experience for our kids there.”
The Tigers opened proceedings up with a win by Ben Lunn at 106 pounds as he took a 6-0 decision; Luke Odom followed that up with a pin at 113 to up the Tiger lead to 9-0. Noah Surtin, at 120, also won by pinfall before Dylan Wright was pinned at 126 and Will Zupanci dropped a 9-2 decision at 132.
Ben Schlueter took a 6-2 decision at 138 to get the Tigers back on track and Joe Griffin won his bout at 145 by a 7-5 score to put the Tigers ahead 21-9. EHS won the next three bouts by pinfall, Raphael Roman at 152, Baylor Montgomery at 160 and Guy Brown at 170 all taking wins over their opponents before Markell DeBerry dropped a 12-10 decision at 181.
The Tigers closed out the meet strong, earning pinfalls in the final three bouts of the evening – Connor Mikulate at 195, Andrew Holderer at 220 and Josh Anderson at 285.
This weekend’s Ron Sauer Tournament takes place in Jefferson County, Mo., at Fox High School in Arnold; bouts are set to begin at 5 p.m. today, with the tournament resuming Saturday morning. The Tigers host Belleville West at 6 p.m. Dec. 8 in their SWC home opener before heading to Minooka for the Minooka Duals Dec. 10.
