Kim North ADVANCING — Oak Glen’s Seth Witherow controls Monroe Central’s Jace Stevens during their 150-pound match Thursday night during the 72nd annual OVAC Ron Mauck Wrestling Championships inside WesBanco Arena. Witherow won by pin.

WHEELING — It was more of the same during Thursday night’s opening night of the 72nd annual OVAC Ron Mauck Wrestling Championships inside WesBanco Arena.

University, the defending overall and Class 5A champions, scored 50.5 points to lead the field and their respective class, while Barnesville, which prevailed two years ago as the overall winner and Class 3A kingpin, is second with 43.5.

Beaver Local leads Class 4A with 27.5 and Caldwell holds a two-point lead over Cameron in Class 1A/2A.

“We had all pins except one major decision,” veteran University head coach Ken Maisel said. “It was a good night for us.”

The Hawks have top seeds in Nico Maisel (150), Maximus Fortier (175), Emerson Murphy (190) and Ryder Hastings (215).

“I don’t think there is any pressure on my kids,” Coach Maisel said. “They just go out and wrestle.”

The Shamrocks also went unbeaten in 11 bouts.

“We did alright. We had a couple of matches that could’ve gone either way that went our way and we had some younger kids with nerves,” Barnesville veteran head coach Jayson Stephen noted. “We also had three byes which didn’t get us any points, but they can do that today.”

Things went pretty much as expected as the seeding committee once again did its due diligence as only three seeded wrestlers fell into the loser’s bracket. The highest being Wheeling Central’s Dustin Sanner who was No. 9 at 215. He was pinned by Buckeye Local’s Ryder Tibbs. A pair of No. 12s also went down at 132 and 165.

Steubenville and John Marshall also fared well in the team races. Big Red checks in second behind University in Class 5A and third overall with 37.5 as 13 of their 14 individuals advanced in the winner’s bracket.

“I thought we wrestled well,” Steubenville head coach Lucas Huffman said. “We had a couple of matches that could have gone either way, but I’m proud of those guys for stepping up and pulling them out.”

The Monarchs are fourth in Class 5A with 18 points. They had five winners, but had seven guys receive forfeits.

“Tonight went about as well as expected,” head coach Ryan Asbury said. “We had a lot of guys with byes, including some seeded wrestlers. We were kind of counting on them to get us rolling tonight, but they will have that same role tomorrow in round two.”

Beaver Local’s Robert Buchheit (150) is trying to become the eighth individual to capture four OVAC Ron Mauck Tournament titles. The other seven include Bridgeport’s Bobby Douglas, East Liverpool’s Mark Emmerling, Edison’s Kelly Shields, St. Clairsville’s Zack Schuller, Wheeling Park’s Abbie Rush, Martins Ferry’s Clay Tucker and Beaver Local’s Adam Hoppel.

There are four wrestlers trying to repeat as champions, those being Linsly’s Brock Humphrey and George Mamakos, Union Local’s Gamble Gossett and Beaver Local’s Jake Hughes. Barnesville’s Colt Carpenter and Linsly’s Malaki Washington are also returning champions, with both winning two years ago.

Of the 144 matches contested Thursday night, 123 ended in pins, with 48 of those coming in less than one minute. There was an 8-second fall and a 9-second fall. There were also 12 technical falls, four major decisions, a quartet of regular decisions and a sudden-victory decision.

Action gets started at noon today with the round of 16 matches in the championship bracket. The girls will participate in an Olympic-style opening ceremony, like the boys, and wrestling will take place at 4 p.m with first-round matches. The boys will get back to action at 6 p.m. with quarterfinals in the championship bracket and first-round consolation bouts.

Prior to the start of Thursday night’s event, several special recognition awards were presented:

• Varsity assistant Coach of the Year went to Barnesville’s Rick Milhoan;

• the OVAC Middle School Coach of the Year went to Sherrard’s Bradlee Clark;

• the OVAC Coaches of the Year were presented with plaques. They were University’s Ken Maisel (5A), Beaver Local’s Johnny McComas (4A), Barnesville’s Jayson Stephen (3A) and Cameron’s Chad Burge (1A/2A).