Sectional title a big step for Edison wrestling
Local wrestlers competing this weekend in Ohio districts, W.Va. state tournament
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Four years ago, when Luke Spencer took over the Edison program, he was taking on the challenge of rebuilding the program.
This past Saturday, Spencer and the Wildcats reached a major milestone in that process -- perhaps faster than even he hoped -- when Edison topped the Division III, East District sectional tournament and qualified eight wrestlers into this weekend's district tournament.
"It's huge for us as a program," Spencer said. "When I first took over four years ago, we only had two kids coming back on the high school team, and we had six on the junior high team, so the program was really at rock bottom.
"For us to come back four years later and win sectionals and send eight kids through to districts is a huge accomplishment."
Edison edged Tuscarawas Valley in the final team standings, 178-173.5.
The title came down to the third-place match at 215 pounds, during which the Wildcats' Jamison Stiles pinned Tusky Valley's Colton Selinsky to seal the deal.
Ethan Waggoner also got a key, final round win over Tusky Valley's Logan Postlethwait by major decision to win the 165-pound title.
Also qualifying to compete for spots in the state tournament at this week's Division III East District tournament at Harrison Central were Logan Pittman at 120; T`Kai Jett at 132 and Caiden Cooley at 138, each of whom placed runner-up; third place finisher Austin Springer at 113; and fourth place finishers Evan Yohman at 126 and Jayden Clancey at 190.
"The kids were ecstatic," Spencer said. "We had a bunch of pins in the first round and we knew we were in the lead. I wasn't sure if we were going to be able to hang on to the lead, but the kids started rallying behind each other and believing in each other and we pushed through and got the victory.
"Hopefully this weekend we come out with the same mindset and the same belief. Hopefully our guys are able to punch their tickets to state. If everybody wrestles to their ability the way we know they can and believes in themselves the way the coaches believe in them, we feel like we can push all eight through to states."
Spencer has felt all season his group could achieve big things if it wrestled to its capability, and late in the season, it has.
"We had a pretty good season overall, but I feel like we really hit our peak late in the season," Spencer said. "We wrestled well earlier in the season, but didn't feel like we had hit our stride yet and (Saturday) we finally felt like we were hitting it at the right time.
"I believed the team was capable of doing big things the whole time, it was just a matter of getting the kids to believe in themselves."
While the turnaround of the program is already impressive with the sectional title, the Wildcats feel they are far from done on the journey.
"Having guys go to state would be huge in this process of building back up the program," Spencer said. "Hopefully some of the underclassmen can get through so they can come back (next season) and share the experience. It's huge for the kids to see that anybody that works hard in the wrestling room is capable of doing great things."
Like the program has as a whole, some of its qualifiers have made a lot of progress in a short time, too.
"My 190-pounder Jayden Clancey didn't start wrestling until his sophomore year, my 215-pounder Jameson Styles didn't start wrestling until his freshman year," Spencer said. "For guys to start that late, it's hard to achieve the things they have. What they've done in a short amount of time is very impressive.
"My four seniors all stepped up and made it through. They know it's their last year, so hopefully they can wrestle hard and end their high school careers with a trip to state.
"It's big, not just for the high school program, but for the junior high program and the kids that are watching. We've got 97 kids in our peewee program now and everybody is looking up to these guys. Hopefully they are able to set the bar high for the kids coming up."
ALSO COMPETING THIS WEEKEND
OHIO
In the Division II East District tournament on its home mats inside the Crimson Center, Big Red will be represented by 10 wrestlers who qualified through last week's sectionals.
They are Cole Harvey (106), Kasyn Berkey (113), Ethan Stimpert (120), Charlie Abbott (126), sectional champ Brody Saccoccia (132), Cal Beadling (138), Kail Simmons (144), Savier Faulks (150), Nolan Blackburn (157) and Landyn Babel (165).
Indian Creek will be represented by seven wrestlers, four of whom won sectional title last week. They are Brock Pendleton (106), Aiden Hendricks (126), sectional champ CJ Spencer (150), sectional champ Dom Paterra (157), sectional champ Ethan Llewellyn (165), Luke McMillion (190) and sectional champ Elijah Llewellyn (215).
Buckeye Local has four wrestlers vying for state tournament slots in Steubenville in Seth Driscoll (126), Logan Dentz (132), Chase McFadden (175) and Brendon Stillion (285)
Joining Edison in Cadiz will be Harrison Central's sectional champs, heavyweight brothers Lucas (215) and Landon (285) Thomas and Servacio Lopez (144).
WEST VIRGINIA
Competing for state titles at the WVSSAC Championships in Huntington, which began Thursday and crown champions on Saturday, are representatives from Oak Glen, Weir High and Brooke.
In Class A/AA, the Golden Bears are led by a trio of regional champions in junior Logan Davis (46-1) at 113, sophomore Hayden Lamb (30-9) at 132 and senior Braxton Dlugopolski (40-5) at 165.
Other Golden Bear qualifiers are sophomore Aiden Anderson (31-13) at 106; freshman Wyatt Wolanski (20-11) at 120; junior Michael Heath (38-11) at 157; sophomore Greg Sauers (37-12) at 190 and freshman Noah Schmidt (21-12) at 285. All are ranked in the top 10 of their respective weight classes.
The Red Riders will be represented by junior Shawn Young (33-9) at 144, and seniors Gage Hawkins (20-9) at 190 and Owen Totten (3-2) at 285.
In Class AAA, Brooke's Joseph Rea (28-12) at 106, Xzander Eltringham (25-12) at 126, Garrett Moore (24-7) at 165, Gavin Moore (17-7) at 175 and Tyler Wise (27-2) at 190 are representing the Bruins.