Wrestling pins down at home tournament

Jonah Evarts, Sports Editor

In their only home meet of the season Manhattan High wrestling tied for first, with five wrestlers going undefeated.

Senior Jalin Harper, senior Hunter Christensen, junior Bubba Wilson, sophomore Daron Island-Jones, and junior Quincy Saddler all went undefeated in the 160, 285, 152, 145, and 170 weight classes. It was Island-Jones’ debut in the Varsity lineup, and Saddler’s first real Varsity action since moving from the 160 to 170 weight class.

“A lot [of the younger wrestlers] have been working hard in practice these past couple of days,” Harper said. “Everyone is getting their weight down to where they need to be and it’s really showing and helping us,”

Manhattan faced Paola in the first round, defeating them 49-28. They went on to beat Smith Center 41-30 in the second round, but lost to Shawnee Heights 34-36 in their third round of the day. The team won out and defeated the rest of their opponents of Abilene and St. Thomas Aquinas, 42-29 and 39-29 in the third and fourth rounds.

“We work hard in practice on certain situations then we get in a match and those situations pop up,” Harper said. “We’ve done a good job of executing, but we still have a long ways to go,”

In the end their loss to Shawnee Heights would only let them tie for first, with the official first place being handed to Shawnee for team points, despite Manhattan’s performances against other schools.  

The Indians will end before break this coming Friday and Saturday at the Grand Island tournament in Nebraska, one of the largest tournaments they’ll compete in. After a third place finish in the tournament last year,  they’ll look to finish out their first stretch of the season strong.

“This week we’re going to work a lot on getting out of leg-riding, because a lot of guys would get on top and we weren’t able to get out of it,” Harper said. “but other than that, we’re just going to go with our same routine and go into the tournament confident, and hopefully get good results.”